163 replies to this topic

[SmokingPuffin]

His Holiness Pope Buster, on 04 October 2016 - 06:05 PM, said:

No anger here just a little puzzled. You didn't explain what your issue was with playing in a two person group in the group queue. The extra tonnage your two man brings to a group queue team is a big advantage.

My complaint is that 2 mans are how I would like to introduce friends to this game, but it's a really terrible new player experience. Two basic problems arise:

1) You can't play the mech you want to play. You have to play big stompy mechs all the time because the matchmaker effectively doesn't consider your actual tonnage like it does in solo queue.
2) There is near zero matchmaking based on skill in the group queue, because group queue population is pretty low and the matchmaker has its hands full just trying to make matches.

This is a recipe for alienating new players.

[SmokingPuffin]

Chagatay, on 05 October 2016 - 01:49 PM, said:

Instead of more buckets or allowing two man groups in solo, why not just tighten the screws on the group matchmaker.

Group queue is already an incredibly difficult problem for the matchmaker, and you're making it harder. Forming 12v12s with all those restrictions is going to result in the matchmaker either taking forever to pair games or disregarding all other elements of balance (tonnage, player skill, etc) to just get games started.

[SmokingPuffin]

RussianWolf, on 05 October 2016 - 12:40 PM, said:

This brings up an point.... if 2 mans are in the solo queue, then 10 man's can no longer work in the Group queue. So Group becomes 3-9+12

Affirmative. This idea of having any group size from 1 to 12 is unique in the gaming world. Almost everyone adopts size restrictions on groups in order to ease matchmaking. For example, WoWS offers a 12v12 game that lets you play in groups of 1-3, or a 7v7 game you can play solo or as a group of 7. Those are all the sizes they offer. No matchmaking for groups of 4-6 or 8-12.

If it were my queue to run, I would have a queue for groups of 1-3 players, and then a lance queue for groups of 1-3 lances (4,8,or 12). This would be easy as pie to matchmake, giving people both faster queues and more balanced matches in exchange for not having perfect group size flexibility.

Edited by SmokingPuffin, 05 October 2016 - 04:36 PM.

[Davers]

SmokingPuffin, on 05 October 2016 - 04:23 PM, said:

My complaint is that 2 mans are how I would like to introduce friends to this game, but it's a really terrible new player experience. Two basic problems arise:

1) You can't play the mech you want to play. You have to play big stompy mechs all the time because the matchmaker effectively doesn't consider your actual tonnage like it does in solo queue.
2) There is near zero matchmaking based on skill in the group queue, because group queue population is pretty low and the matchmaker has its hands full just trying to make matches.

This is a recipe for alienating new players.

Hey, everything you say is true, but being in a 2 man group is an advantage over solo players. Not a huge crushing advantage, but an advantage nonetheless. And for every 2 man group of new players learning the ropes there will be an optimized 2 man that have played hundreds of games together and know how to move and support each other. As I said in the beginning, the only question is do players feel it Is worth It in order to help the game.

[Pariah Devalis]

Small unit people like myself are stuck between a rock and hard place. On one hand, we can solo queue, and that's fine. Until you get tired of dealing with glue sniffers, and we have to try and game the system by sync dropping to play with or against one another - and there is no guarentee of even being in the same match. On the other hand, we could take our 2-3 man into group queue... and get matched up against 10-man T1 teams all night long, which is just god awful.

Either we have an extremely difficult time playing with one another in ANY capacity, or we have a string of terrible gameplay experiences. Screwed either way.

Frankly, if MWO's group queue was limited to max of 4 people per group, you could both limit the amount of pull any single group of players could have on the outcome of a game, and retain a totally random solo queue.

Biggest, most vocal argument about that, however, comes from the people in the much larger, much more healthy, much more active groups which, in all honestly, probably make up the minority of the units out there. They want to play with as many friends as they can. I get that. I do. However, your right to have fun ends the moment it impacts the opportunity for others to have fun.

You want to play with more than 4 of you, but don't want to enter 12v12 matches? Sync drop. You're guaranteed to be playing with your friends, either way. Whether or not the sync actually succeeds. Sometimes you might play with more of your friends, sometimes against, but you have three buddies locked in with you either way. At extremely minimal risk of being stuck up against juggernaut premades all night long.

If group queue capped out at 4 per group, like it used to be? My god, that would be wonderful.

Edited by Pariah Devalis, 05 October 2016 - 04:58 PM.

[Deathlike]

Pariah Devalis, on 05 October 2016 - 04:56 PM, said:

Small unit people like myself are stuck between a rock and hard place. On one hand, we can solo queue, and that's fine. Until you get tired of dealing with glue sniffers, and we have to try and game the system by sync dropping to play with or against one another - and there is no guarentee of even being in the same match. On the other hand, we could take our 2-3 man into group queue... and get matched up against 10-man T1 teams all night long, which is just god awful.

Either we have an extremely difficult time playing with one another in ANY capacity, or we have a string of terrible gameplay experiences. Screwed either way.

Frankly, if MWO's group queue was limited to max of 4 people per group, you could both limit the amount of pull any single group of players could have on the outcome of a game, and retain a totally random solo queue.

Biggest, most vocal argument about that, however, comes from the people in the much larger, much more healthy, much more active groups which, in all honestly, probably make up the minority of the units out there. They want to play with as many friends as they can. I get that. I do. However, your right to have fun ends the moment it impacts the opportunity for others to have fun.

You want to play with more than 4 of you, but don't want to enter 12v12 matches? Sync drop. You're guaranteed to be playing with your friends, either way. Whether or not the sync actually succeeds. Sometimes you might play with more of your friends, sometimes against, but you have three buddies locked in with you either way. At extremely minimal risk of being stuck up against juggernaut premades all night long.

If group queue capped out at 4 per group, like it used to be? My god, that would be wonderful.

Back when that was a decision in Beta, it culled quite a number of players and groups. The only difference was that solos and groups were integrated.

Despite that sounding good, you're going to cull more people that currently play the game. I'm not saying that idea is great or better, but your core issue is still people wanting to play together. Ruining that defeats the point of playing together.. back when being the 5th-man was actually a negative.

Having less people in groups doesn't solve the failure of people working together.. which is the core reason why people win or lose in this game.

Edited by Deathlike, 05 October 2016 - 05:06 PM.

[Pariah Devalis]

Deathlike, on 05 October 2016 - 05:06 PM, said:

Back when that was a decision in Beta, it culled quite a number of players and groups. The only difference was that solos and groups were integrated.

Despite that sounding good, you're going to cull more people that currently play the game. I'm not saying that idea is great or better, but your core issue is still people wanting to play together. Ruining that defeats the point of playing together.. back when being the 5th-man was actually a negative.

Having less people in groups doesn't solve the failure of people working together.. which is the core reason why people win or lose in this game.

Meh. Sync dropping multiple groups was never difficult. Ever. We're talking about those who are guaranteed to drop with friends in group queue vs those who have no such guarantee if they attempt to sync in solo, and get completely marginalized or absolutely demolished time and time again should they try group queue. The fact that MWO allows such an overwhelmingly large group size is astounding. MANY successful games out there intentionally limit maximum group sizes to between 30% and 50% of the maximum team size precisely because teamwork is OP. The more people who train together, drop together, com together, and are accustomed to working together on one team dramatically shifts the odds of success.

Obviously, you can beat a 10-man with a bunch of smaller groups. It happens. Just not terribly often. By limiting the impact any one group can have on the outcome of the game (especially since group queue implies 2-4 players, so the individual group sizes per team are similar), it forces the team to actually communicate with one another. In a weird way, it actually forces an increase in teamwork, as odd as it sounds.

By that, I mean try being the 2-man on a team with a 10-man. That 2-man is going to be ignored. Right off the bat, it is usually considered at best a distraction, and at worst already written off as dead weight. So much so that the 10-man will not even bother communicating with the 2-man. If that 2-man has the presence of mind to try and communicate info over VoiP, it's a whole other level of crapshoot if anyone in the 10-man is going to even hear it over their own coms. Assuming they didn't just disable in game VoiP in the first place.

Smaller groups, however? Each group MUST communicate. No one group has the luxury of being so well organized it can write off the others. It equalizes the importance of each group, thereby increasing the need and proliferation of actual voice communication in the team.

Edited by Pariah Devalis, 05 October 2016 - 05:16 PM.

[Pariah Devalis]

Further, you wanna talk about culling people? That crap is what ultimately chokes out the smaller groups. It's a rock and hard place situation. Either your group gets absorbed into a larger one - loosing the feel and closeness that is the entire purpose of being a small group in the first place, you bash your head against the large premades until you hate the game, or you stop playing altogether.

Edited by Pariah Devalis, 05 October 2016 - 05:22 PM.

[MadcatX]

Davers, on 05 October 2016 - 04:55 PM, said:

Hey, everything you say is true, but being in a 2 man group is an advantage over solo players. Not a huge crushing advantage, but an advantage nonetheless. And for every 2 man group of new players learning the ropes there will be an optimized 2 man that have played hundreds of games together and know how to move and support each other. As I said in the beginning, the only question is do players feel it Is worth It in order to help the game.

Well, I feel getting new players into the game is a bit more important then the hypothetical epic seal-clubbing 2-man. I'm sure there would be 2 man groups, but we can't tell how many would form or even how large an impact they would have.

What we do know however is that currently, this game is only getting advertising through word of mouth. If you Google Mechwarrior: Online and go past the obligatory links for the page, it's reddit, a twitter account and try to find articles about it from any mainstream gaming website or popular youtube personality, the most recent thing you'll find is when is back during the Steam launch. Honnestly I'm sort of surprised I didn't see anything about the tournament yet making any kind of headline.

With word of mouth you'll generally get 1 friend to give it a try at any given time, that's our new player. Now the issue is the new player experience is taking place in the group queue and I don't think that's the best place for a new player to get the best first impression of a game they've never played.

[Deathlike]

Pariah Devalis, on 05 October 2016 - 05:15 PM, said:

Meh. Sync dropping multiple groups was never difficult. Ever. We're talking about those who are guaranteed to drop with friends in group queue vs those who have no such guarantee if they attempt to sync in solo, and get completely marginalized or absolutely demolished time and time again should they try group queue. The fact that MWO allows such an overwhelmingly large group size is astounding. MANY successful games out there intentionally limit maximum group sizes to between 30% and 50% of the maximum team size precisely because teamwork is OP. The more people who train together, drop together, com together, and are accustomed to working together on one team dramatically shifts the odds of success.

Obviously, you can beat a 10-man with a bunch of smaller groups. It happens. Just not terribly often. By limiting the impact any one group can have on the outcome of the game (especially since group queue implies 2-4 players, so the individual group sizes per team are similar), it forces the team to actually communicate with one another. In a weird way, it actually forces an increase in teamwork, as odd as it sounds.

By that, I mean try being the 2-man on a team with a 10-man. That 2-man is going to be ignored. Right off the bat, it is usually considered at best a distraction, and at worst already written off as dead weight. So much so that the 10-man will not even bother communicating with the 2-man. If that 2-man has the presence of mind to try and communicate info over VoiP, it's a whole other level of crapshoot if anyone in the 10-man is going to even hear it over their own coms. Assuming they didn't just disable in game VoiP in the first place.

Smaller groups, however? Each group MUST communicate. No one group has the luxury of being so well organized it can write off the others. It equalizes the importance of each group, thereby increasing the need and proliferation of actual voice communication in the team.

I never talked about sync dropping (and It'll inevitably come up). It's not the worst thing in the world... unless you have conspiracy theories like a certain few have.

The basic thing the 2-man does with a 10-man is literally work with the 10-man. This is basic teamwork that I rarely see.

The fact that it isn't even practiced in the solo queues (as devoid a place that is), that is a core problem.

Excusing the fact that people really aren't practicing teamwork, it shows in every freaking FW/CW argument ever.

[Pariah Devalis]

Deathlike, on 05 October 2016 - 05:28 PM, said:

I never talked about sync dropping (and It'll inevitably come up). It's not the worst thing in the world... unless you have conspiracy theories like a certain few have.

The basic thing the 2-man does with a 10-man is literally work with the 10-man. This is basic teamwork that I rarely see.

The fact that it isn't even practiced in the solo queues (as devoid a place that is), that is a core problem.

Excusing the fact that people really aren't practicing teamwork, it shows in every freaking FW/CW argument ever.

TBQF, I'd write off 2 mans in public queue right then and there. It circumvents the issue that we have a game where any one group of players can have a disproportionate amount of influence in any given game by shear volume of numbers, alone. Toss on communication which is inevitable in a premade, and you have something that is downright unhealthy in group setting. Reducing group queue to a far smaller number, like groups no larger than 4, is a far more hospitable environment both for new users being shown the game by friends, or for smaller sized units.


Further, sync dropping is an inevitability, regardless of maximum group sizes in any setting. It's a means to bypass the normal limitations of the system. If you are fortunate enough to be in a unit with plentiful active members, you don't need to make the choice between trying to sync in public queue or be at extreme risk of going up against very large premades. Or, equally as bad, being marginalized by one.

Edited by Pariah Devalis, 05 October 2016 - 05:33 PM.

[Deathlike]

Pariah Devalis, on 05 October 2016 - 05:19 PM, said:

Further, you wanna talk about culling people? That crap is what ultimately chokes out the smaller groups. It's a rock and hard place situation. Either your group gets absorbed into a larger one - loosing the feel and closeness that is the entire purpose of being a small group in the first place, you bash your head against the large premades until you hate the game, or you stop playing altogether.

I've played in competent smaller groups. It looks vastly different if you're a casual smaller group... which I've also been in too.

If there was a "casual" queue as I've described with a "group" queue to go with it (for people that prefer a challenge and in need of those C-bills to be useful), then we wouldn't have a dramatic difference in quality of play that we do now.

Pariah Devalis, on 05 October 2016 - 05:31 PM, said:

TBQF, I'd write off 2 mans in public queue right then and there. It circumvents the issue that we have a game where any one group of players can have a disproportionate amount of influence in any given game by shear volume of numbers, alone. Toss on communication which is inevitable in a premade, and you have something that is downright unhealthy in group setting. Reducing group queue to a far smaller number, like groups no larger than 4, is a far more hospitable environment both for new users being shown the game by friends, or for smaller sized units.

Your issue is literally not willing to work with the bigger group.

That's the problem here. I'm not saying the bigger group is right, but your chances of winning diminishes when you do your own thing.

[Pariah Devalis]

Deathlike, on 05 October 2016 - 05:32 PM, said:

I've played in competent smaller groups. It looks vastly different if you're a casual smaller group... which I've also been in too.

If there was a "casual" queue as I've described with a "group" queue to go with it (for people that prefer a challenge and in need of those C-bills to be useful), then we wouldn't have a dramatic difference in quality of play that we do now.



Your issue is literally not willing to work with the bigger group.

That's the problem here. I'm not saying the bigger group is right, but your chances of winning diminishes when you do your own thing.

That's a bit of an assumption on your behalf. My goal is to win in a game I play. I serve my goal by being a team player, as that increases my chance of meeting that goal. However, if the team is ignoring intel because I'm the 2 and they are the 10, then... no. I've even seen games lost because of this. They simply ignore good intel, and do their own thing, and get shish'd 'cause of it.

That is not a problem of communication or teamwork on my behalf. That is the all too common side effect of being a small group in a large group environment.

Edited by Pariah Devalis, 05 October 2016 - 05:38 PM.

[Deathlike]

Pariah Devalis, on 05 October 2016 - 05:34 PM, said:

That's a bit of an assumption on your behalf. My goal is to win in a game I play. I serve my goal by being a team player, as that increases my chance of meeting that goal. However, if the team is ignoring intel because I'm the 2 and they are the 10, then... no. I've even seen games lost because of this. They simply ignore good intel, and do their own thing, and get shish'd 'cause of it.

That is not a problem of communication or teamwork on my behalf. That is the all too common side effect of being a small group in a large group environment.

Ignoring Intel has nothing to do with teamsize though.

[Pariah Devalis]

Deathlike, on 05 October 2016 - 05:42 PM, said:

Ignoring Intel has nothing to do with teamsize though.

Let me try and clarify this. I believe there's a critical point here that isn't getting across, and I assume you are not being intentionally obtuse, here.

Yes. Teamwork matters. Communication matters. Failures on both accounts happens in solo queue or group queue.

However.

As a small group player, in said 2+10 example, the problem is exceedingly common that the larger group ignores the smaller group's members. They are preemptively written off. For all intents and purposes, the larger group considers your two man collateral damage, wasted assets, and not worth listening to. There are 10 of them, and only 2 of you. You are unimportant. You are of no impact on the game.

What I'm saying is that because there is such a large number of people in a group, working together, they will not communicate with the smaller group or listen to the smaller groups information. If ten of them think one thing, the two must be wrong. Even if it turns out they were absolutely right. That assumption is directly anti-teamwork. It is a function of mob mentality. The larger the group, the stronger the mob mentality. The smaller or more equal the group sizes, the less that mentality takes over.

Numbers of members in a given group directly relate to this.

This sucks tremendously for small group members when stuck on teams like this. You are forced to all but be an observer in a game that is playing out around you, even though you are participating in it as much as you can, because you don't exist in the minds of the masses.

Flipside is if you go up against a 10 man as a 2 man. You can try and communicate with the various smaller groups on your team, but you won't be as fluid or nearly as efficient as the one large enemy premade. You won't know how each of you fight, how each of you respond, who to trust on a push, and how they will handle under stress. The big enemy team? They know.

Edited by Pariah Devalis, 05 October 2016 - 05:52 PM.

[Davers]

MadcatX, on 05 October 2016 - 05:27 PM, said:

Well, I feel getting new players into the game is a bit more important then the hypothetical epic seal-clubbing 2-man. I'm sure there would be 2 man groups, but we can't tell how many would form or even how large an impact they would have.

What we do know however is that currently, this game is only getting advertising through word of mouth. If you Google Mechwarrior: Online and go past the obligatory links for the page, it's reddit, a twitter account and try to find articles about it from any mainstream gaming website or popular youtube personality, the most recent thing you'll find is when is back during the Steam launch. Honnestly I'm sort of surprised I didn't see anything about the tournament yet making any kind of headline.

With word of mouth you'll generally get 1 friend to give it a try at any given time, that's our new player. Now the issue is the new player experience is taking place in the group queue and I don't think that's the best place for a new player to get the best first impression of a game they've never played.

I agree that MWO has zero marketing. Not a single person I've mentioned this game to in other games has even heard of it.

And it isn't even about seal clubbing if it's limited to just 2 man groups. But we already have the numbers from last time. 50% of all groups are 2 man groups, and they win an average of 7% more games than solo players. I don't expect a huge shift in those numbers, maybe a few percent

Its just a question if people are willing to accept that there isn't a solo que anymore.

[Deathlike]

Pariah Devalis, on 05 October 2016 - 05:49 PM, said:

Let me try and clarify this. I believe there's a critical point here that isn't getting across, and I assume you are not being intentionally obtuse, here.

Yes. Teamwork matters. Communication matters. Failures on both accounts happens in solo queue or group queue.

However.

As a small group player, in said 2+10 example, the problem is exceedingly common that the larger group ignores the smaller group's members. They are preemptively written off. For all intents and purposes, the larger group considers your two man collateral damage, wasted assets, and not worth listening to. There are 10 of them, and only 2 of you. You are unimportant. You are of no impact on the game.

What I'm saying is that because there is such a large number of people in a group, working together, they will not communicate with the smaller group or listen to the smaller groups information. If ten of them think one thing, the two must be wrong. Even if it turns out they were absolutely right. That assumption is directly anti-teamwork. It is a function of mob mentality. The larger the group, the stronger the mob mentality. The smaller or more equal the group sizes, the less that mentality takes over.

Numbers of members in a given group directly relate to this.

This sucks tremendously for small group members when stuck on teams like this. You are forced to all but be an observer in a game that is playing out around you, even though you are participating in it as much as you can, because you don't exist in the minds of the masses.

Flipside is if you go up against a 10 man as a 2 man. You can try and communicate with the various smaller groups on your team, but you won't be as fluid or nearly as efficient as the one large enemy premade. You won't know how each of you fight, how each of you respond, who to trust on a push, and how they will handle under stress. The big enemy team? They know.

Dude... I've been part of a 2-man when there's a 10-man on a team. It is the least complicated thing to do to work with who you get. The issue is almost always with people "not knowing what to do". Even the simplest of teamwork is to literally help the guy next to you to the best of your ability. Maybe that's just Lostech... I dunno.

People simple don't practice this often enough on their own, and frankly get lost when it comes time to actually figure this stuff out.

You don't need the most complicated instructions to do basic teamwork.

[Pariah Devalis]

Deathlike, on 05 October 2016 - 06:00 PM, said:

Dude... I've been part of a 2-man when there's a 10-man on a team. It is the least complicated thing to do to work with who you get. The issue is almost always with people "not knowing what to do". Even the simplest of teamwork is to literally help the guy next to you to the best of your ability. Maybe that's just Lostech... I dunno.

People simple don't practice this often enough on their own, and frankly get lost when it comes time to actually figure this stuff out.

You don't need the most complicated instructions to do basic teamwork.

Quite frankly, I feel like I am talking to a wall with the point I'm trying to make simply not getting across. As such, we will continue to disagree, and can only agree that we disagree, and leave it at that.

[Deathlike]

Pariah Devalis, on 05 October 2016 - 06:02 PM, said:

Quite frankly, I feel like I am talking to a wall with the point I'm trying to make simply not getting across. As such, we will continue to disagree, and can only agree that we disagree, and leave it at that.

I'm not saying the large premade doesn't communicate... in fact I would say that is common.

The difference is that it wouldn't be anything complicated like "regroup with us here", or we'll be attacking X location in 10 seconds.

It's no different from FW/CW in the grand scheme of things.

[MadcatX]

Davers, on 05 October 2016 - 05:57 PM, said:

Its just a question if people are willing to accept that there isn't a solo que anymore.

Ah I see. You are right that that is a definite issue because there is still a stigma about pre-made boogiemans that will stomp everyone, Although with 2-mans, this is to a lesser degree but the mindset is still there.