54 replies to this topic

[Davegt27]

they did say there would be an FW event this weekend

I believe in PGI's ability to get players to play FW the problem is how to keep them

no one asked why they are adding the QP maps don't get me wrong not a bad idea
but I still feel the core Mechanic for FW is the problem

now if the QP MM is some how tied to the quick play maps then that would be an interesting twist
it would mean the figured out a way to use the QP MM (matchmaker) work in FW

if the core FW mechanics are not worked on then everything is just relabeling and moving around

lastly pugs/seals where not mentioned I found that an interesting omission

maybe its such a sore topic Russ would rather not go there
I would say Russ is listening to bigger units and trying his best to give them what they want

I would feel better if PGI said this is our vision of FW/CW and our idea of what it should be like
but it seems to me everything is a knee jerk reaction
there software updates are even called patches

right now the story on the street is long wait times is the big problem so the fix for that is pool the players into smaller
areas (buckets)

I think long wait times is a problem but it is not the major problem
anyway time will tell

[Carl Vickers]

The issue with events is too many of the and peeps get tired of them and get burnt out and go play something else.

If the only way PGI can get peeps to play CW/FW ect is events there are other problems that need to be looked at first.

What they are doing will solve peoples rage at wait times for a month or 3 then they will be back to raging cause it is just dead set boring, pretty much like the rest of this game. Nothing changes, no development, just team deathmatch.

They have so few ideas that they save their best one for mechcon, skill tree revamp. That alone should tell people how bereft of ideas and where the future of this game is headed.

[BLOOD WOLF]

Carl Vickers, on 08 September 2016 - 08:10 PM, said:

The issue with events is too many of the and peeps get tired of them and get burnt out and go play something else.

If the only way PGI can get peeps to play CW/FW ect is events there are other problems that need to be looked at first.

What they are doing will solve peoples rage at wait times for a month or 3 then they will be back to raging cause it is just dead set boring, pretty much like the rest of this game. Nothing changes, no development, just team deathmatch.

They have so few ideas that they save their best one for mechcon, skill tree revamp. That alone should tell people how bereft of ideas and where the future of this game is headed.

And he missed the target by not 1, not 2, not 3, but 4k miles folks

[Carl Vickers]

BLOOD WOLF, on 08 September 2016 - 08:14 PM, said:

And he missed the target by not 1, not 2, not 3, but 4k miles folks

Your opinion would mean more if you werent in CWI.

[Mystere]

Collapsing factions? I think these signs say it all:





(edit: spelling)

Edited by Mystere, 09 September 2016 - 07:46 AM.

[FallingAce]

Mixed Bag.

2 Pro

Removal off the long tom. 143 days too late.(start of phase 3 for those of you that haven't been loyal) Never should have made it out of testing

Involving other modes into faction warfare. Almost anything has to be better than the current choke point meat grinder.(I hope)


2 Cons

So the 1st 2 months after the relaunch will still be winner take all? Throw the small units a bone.
How hard is it to code a way to divide the 15mc rewards among more than 1 group.

The current contract system not being changed. Mercs jumping every 7 days leading to no stability. Allowing mercs to dog pile into 1 faction leaving other factions dormant. Penalizing loyalist. This really need to be addressed.


1 WTF
The Buckets.
How about leaving the buckets alone at the relaunch? If PGI actually delivers a viable Faction Warfare mode, the buckets will take care of themselves.

Edited by FallingAce, 09 September 2016 - 12:15 AM.

[Sunstruck]

If you listen back to the podcast while thinking back to Phase 2 every one of Russ's problems were already solved.

Buckets: Phase 2, wasn't a major problem, people were playing and switching houses on mechbay tours.

Alliances: Phase 2, didn't need them our own unit commanders would actually talk to one another and create alliances outside MWO.

Long tom: Didn't exist, wasn't an issue.

PGI look at the facts, Phase 2 works better than 3, go back to the code and edit it back to Phase 2, get your player base back instead of ruining the game even more.

[AnTi90d]

FallingAce, on 09 September 2016 - 12:14 AM, said:

Pro..
Involving other modes into faction warfare. Almost anything has to be better than the current choke point meat grinder.(I hope

The Quickplay maps aren't set up to protect spawn points.. they're set up to encourage Nascarring counterclockwise. 12x4v12x4 is going to be a bloody on most maps. It'll give pugs the same feeling as playing vs a 12 man on Emerald Taiga Counterattack; one lance at a time will be spawn camped into oblivion.

Domination and the new Assault might run OK.. but Conquest is going to be anti-fun and Skirmish will be whichever team is in the lead spawn camps the other.

I suggested, in that 50+ page thread that Russ and Bombadil ignored, that the new Assault could work in FP. They're creating bases and having some base defenses would alleviate that problem.. but either someone at the top has a serious learning disability, or they're making decisions that only benefit the large Mercenary units that just want to farm pugs to 48.

[Hotthedd]

Husker Dude, on 08 September 2016 - 07:33 AM, said:

I think the only thing that I heard that I wasn't super crazy about was the idea of putting limited drop deck respawns into quick play; as much as I'd like the ability to choose what mech to play once I know the map, we have enough of a problem with having to repeatedly tell players in FW to not reinforce every match, I'd not be interested in having to do something similar in every QP match as well, even though the game modes will be very different.

Just to put out there that there is an opposite side to that spectrum.

Having the QP maps added to FP is an idea that I like. As a matter of fact I would have supported making QP part of FW instead of mixed tech drops.

Unfortunately, adding re-spawn to the mix is the last straw for me, and I might be the minority, but when that happens I will uninstall.

[vocifer]

The history always goes by spiral...

It's gonna be a "FPQP Phase1" with DZ farming and pug whines. People will still play the mode because it's something new and different.
Then, ater ~6 months we'll have "FPQP Phase2" with elevated DZ's and boxes around Assault structures. Frankly, unlike Invasion/Counterattack, camping in own DZ will provide no benefits.
And after a ~1y we'll have "FPQP Phase3" with our "LongTomTerm goals" delivered. Hopefully.

Pretty much how I see the roadmap^^.

Edited by vocifer, 09 September 2016 - 07:48 AM.

[Monkey Lover]

So they have a round table with mostly mercs units and now the faction part of cw is basically removed. The hell you say lol

[Kael Posavatz]

the thing is...okay, there are a couple of things.

First, the changes coming out go well beyond what was discussed at the round-table.

Second, the way PGI came to those changes took longer than anyone was really happy with, and the time it will take to implement those changes the same. ( As I recall they were looking for a 3-month turn-around from Round-table to patch, but I could be wrong.)

Third, good to hear that revised rewards are in the future.

Fourth, If it is going to take 5-6 months to go from round-table to patch, I'm not sure how much use these RT will be in suggesting changes to improve FW. It just seems far too long.

[justcallme A S H]

AnTi90d, on 09 September 2016 - 07:11 AM, said:

The Quickplay maps aren't set up to protect spawn points.. they're set up to encourage Nascarring counterclockwise. 12x4v12x4 is going to be a bloody on most maps. It'll give pugs the same feeling as playing vs a 12 man on Emerald Taiga Counterattack; one lance at a time will be spawn camped into oblivion.

Domination and the new Assault might run OK.. but Conquest is going to be anti-fun and Skirmish will be whichever team is in the lead spawn camps the other.

I suggested, in that 50+ page thread that Russ and Bombadil ignored, that the new Assault could work in FP. They're creating bases and having some base defenses would alleviate that problem.. but either someone at the top has a serious learning disability, or they're making decisions that only benefit the large Mercenary units that just want to farm pugs to 48.

Aye, this is my major concern also. DZ camping.

And there is no want to randomise it either (given you work out the coords fast/easy). Even something like buffing dropships so much that people can't do it because on some maps you could easily pin the mechs in the DZ from 800m out. In fact on most maps you can.

[50 50]

I like that there is a move to include the quick play maps and modes into faction play, I believe this is necessary not only for increasing the scope of faction play, but also for making the mode familiar to players to transition into.

However the condensing of the queues and the argument of 'too many buckets' I believe is being approached from the wrong direction. The ability to participate in faction play is too steep and has no ability to scale with the number of players.
While everyone is thinking that the solution is to push everyone together so we are not so spread out, this still doesn't address the requirements to be able to participate.

We have to approach it from the other direction, that being: "How can a solo player with a single mech get into the battle straight away?" If we address that, then number of players and number of buckets become less of an issue if not insignificant all together because it can start with a solo and scale up. Open Continual Warfare solves so many of the problems.

[Red Shrike]

I think I'm going to need a bullet point summary before I can form an opinion.

[A Shoddy Rental Mech]

Red Shrike, on 14 September 2016 - 11:56 PM, said:

I think I'm going to need a bullet point summary before I can form an opinion.

• Good
  
• good
  
• bad
  
• bad
  
• meh
  
• WTF

Sums it up nicely.

[Red Shrike]

The Nerf Bat, on 15 September 2016 - 12:39 AM, said:

• Good
  
• good
  
• bad
  
• bad
  
• meh
  
• WTF

Sums it up nicely.

Pretty sure you're just ******** me.

I tried listening to a round table once. It was 90% small talk.

[LordNothing]

Davegt27, on 08 September 2016 - 07:53 PM, said:

they did say there would be an FW event this weekend

I believe in PGI's ability to get players to play FW the problem is how to keep them

no one asked why they are adding the QP maps don't get me wrong not a bad idea
but I still feel the core Mechanic for FW is the problem

now if the QP MM is some how tied to the quick play maps then that would be an interesting twist
it would mean the figured out a way to use the QP MM (matchmaker) work in FW

if the core FW mechanics are not worked on then everything is just relabeling and moving around

lastly pugs/seals where not mentioned I found that an interesting omission

maybe its such a sore topic Russ would rather not go there
I would say Russ is listening to bigger units and trying his best to give them what they want

I would feel better if PGI said this is our vision of FW/CW and our idea of what it should be like
but it seems to me everything is a knee jerk reaction
there software updates are even called patches

right now the story on the street is long wait times is the big problem so the fix for that is pool the players into smaller
areas (buckets)

I think long wait times is a problem but it is not the major problem
anyway time will tell

the only type of match maker i would swing for is a group type matching. no tiers or anything. just rate each groups pugginess and try to match close values if remotely possible. it could be a binary system, if you have a group of 6 or more you are not considered pugs, otherwise you are. and like groups take priority over dissimilar groups. you might go up to 3 or 4 levels of pugginess, 4 being all solos, 1 being a 12 man with the same unit tag. in this case closer values match first. you dont want it to be a totally split queue, you just one most of the pug games to be with other pugs and same with groups. you still want them to see what an organized unit can do from time to time, but in a way where they dont get discouraged and retreat to quick play. the ones who enjoy the mode may stick around long enough to join units and thats what you want.

also that would never work with number of buckets we have now. the four bucket system would be more tolerant of it, but it would also have dynamic front toggles, which would distribute overpopulated buckets and condense underpopulated ones. soft controls may also work, like hand out bonuses for one target vs another. sort of like the com star intercepts. except they would be generated to have players fight in the most optimal battles that reduce overall wait times and try to keep them consistent across the board. so yea theres no silver bullet for this one. its going to require 2 or 3 major systems all introduced at the same time. where as pgi likes to introduce part of a system, have it fail on its own, and then abandon the whole plan.

[BearFlag]

PGI has a knack for not seeing ahead when they come up with a good idea but then create a flawed implementation.

The buckets thing is largely a non-issue. The origin of long wait times isn't long wait times. The origin of low population is not only long wait times. It is a game mode (Invasion) that 90% can't stand. Spawn camps, choke points, grossly imbalanced matches, - we've heard the list before. Sorry. Nothing fixes the queues in Invasion until the mode is improved. By the end of January 2015, barely a month after release, it's problems were already aired. Other than a couple of failed quick fixes (drop deck weights, armed dropships, et al) nothing has significantly addressed core problems.

The other reason buckets are not a big deal: the queues are largely self-regulating by the players. Outside of the event, it was common to see one planet active and four with big zeros in the queue. Players gravitate to the where the action is. The only problem is that not all queues are visible to a player. If they were, if FRR could join on Steiner's attack planet, I think the action would still focus on a subset. Could be wrong here. But if the players CAN self-regulate, then that should probably be the preferred method. If not, then maybe a reduction is justified.

Quickplay mode in FW:
Great idea. Big problem already. Instead of bringing the best of QP into FW, the proposal is to bring the worst of FW to a QP/FW mode. Russ said that respawn and drop decks was "just assumed" and that it was a "no brainer." It's a brainer, possibly of the flatulent type. If you have drop decks and teams (12 man?), you reduce or eliminate possible involvement by the matchmaker and likely end up with the FW simple queue. We all know what that means. Blow out matches that miserably extend across four mechs. Invasion deja vu. At least in QP a bad match is over and done with one death. Duplicate the carnage of Invasion mode and you'll duplicate the exodus.


This is a very long post informed by my own experience in IT. It's a detailed and as frugal as possible approach to including QP modes (sans respawn) in FW, involving the matchmaker, pilot recruitment, etc.
http://mwomercs.com/...qp-modes-in-fw/

[BLOOD WOLF]

Sunstruck, on 09 September 2016 - 03:22 AM, said:

If you listen back to the podcast while thinking back to Phase 2 every one of Russ's problems were already solved.

Buckets: Phase 2, wasn't a major problem, people were playing and switching houses on mechbay tours.

Alliances: Phase 2, didn't need them our own unit commanders would actually talk to one another and create alliances outside MWO.

Long tom: Didn't exist, wasn't an issue.

PGI look at the facts, Phase 2 works better than 3, go back to the code and edit it back to Phase 2, get your player base back instead of ruining the game even more.

. IF people have a reason to play FW and it was more compelling it wouldn't matter if there was at least 5 planets up for contest. Although 5 might be to much but they get what I mean. The boarders have been active since the last week. We even had a problem on the wolf boarder where we had basically taken the planet a few hours in.

Edited by BLOOD WOLF, 17 September 2016 - 09:24 PM.