29 replies to this topic

[xX PUG Xx]

.... I really am starting to feel the frustration. What's the point when the only fights are against CJF?

If this is basically how FP will look in a few months, minus the actual factions, then what is the point to it all? There is zero activity on any planet that is visible, not a single player on any planet and while it may be 11am in the UK it doesn't bode well that it is so quiet.

Even though I would love to advocate that the IS vs Clan angle will be fun and it should encourage a true rivalry between the Loyalists of each side, I fear the reality is that it simply will completely kill off the mode. Successfully removing the one game type that keeps me and most of my unit playing the game.

Perhaps the one diamond in the rough is that it will be easier for PGI to balance the Drop Deck tonnage to even out the supposed imbalance in tech at the moment.... I feel compelled to at least try and find a positive in this or perhaps a lack of alcohol and sleep has got me depressed and seeing the doom'n'gloom.

[AnTi90d]

IDK which I'm more disgusted about:

FP being turned into QP with dropdecks (yuck)

or

factions being stripped of their identity and shoved into one bukkit.

[Jugger Grimrod]

Smile! Buy a mech pack!

We've been lining up IS vs IS fights the past few nights, so things are looking a little better down here.

Edited by Jugger Grimrod, 20 October 2016 - 02:36 AM.

[Black Ivan]

I have to admit that I stopped playing CW without frins fromth unit some time ago, because in it's current form it is just bad and nothing PGI is doing at thr moment chamges that. But hey, wanna buy a Mech Pack? *shackes head

[Bud Crue]

xX PUG Xx, on 20 October 2016 - 01:48 AM, said:

.... I really am starting to feel the frustration. What's the point when the only fights are against CJF?

If this is basically how FP will look in a few months, minus the actual factions, then what is the point to it all? There is zero activity on any planet that is visible, not a single player on any planet and while it may be 11am in the UK it doesn't bode well that it is so quiet.

Even though I would love to advocate that the IS vs Clan angle will be fun and it should encourage a true rivalry between the Loyalists of each side, I fear the reality is that it simply will completely kill off the mode. Successfully removing the one game type that keeps me and most of my unit playing the game.

Perhaps the one diamond in the rough is that it will be easier for PGI to balance the Drop Deck tonnage to even out the supposed imbalance in tech at the moment.... I feel compelled to at least try and find a positive in this or perhaps a lack of alcohol and sleep has got me depressed and seeing the doom'n'gloom.

Wholeheartedly agree. I am looking for an excuse to get back into CW. Apropos, one of the funnest and skilled people I drop with in QP is thinking of starting a new dedicated CW group, but I can't help but think...why bother? As not only does the current playing population suggest we will rarely if ever get matches, but most of us, as once dedicated FRR loyalists who came to this game to play as FRR in phase 2 no longer really have that motivation we once rallied around: "Fight the clan invasion!" "Take back the FRR from the clan!" Now with planets and fronts being essentially arbitrary/dictated by what CJF is up too, we would be playing a mode that most are avoiding, and thus providing less actual matches/play (and less rewards, if that is your thing), for no other reason/motivation than is currently found in QP.

So what does CW offer anymore? The joy of gates? The love of fighting all Kodiak-3s first wave? But for the Huntsman and the new Summoner, that's what QP is -every wave. That deep, deep strategy of four mech respawn? For that I can just play four QP matches and pretend that Terra Therma is a CW map. So I keep wondering what is the point of CW anymore. PGI seems to disregard it -and Russ's bucket combining proposals will not change any of those spiffy "core" aspects at all- so it should not be a shock to any of us that the players are having a heck of a time finding a reason to play it. So give us one PGI. Anything. Please.

[GrimmigerPetz]

Great for you Jugger Grimrod.

I hate it, that for House Steiner Loyalists there is only one faction to vote on left: Jade Falcon.

I didnot find an answer for that situation in the forum yet.

But for my unit FP Invasion is nearly dead. Only Scouting remains interesting, but
when more then 4 of us are online we have to split and the "together" feeling goes down.

The last Invasion drop was an Attack vs EVIL on Boreal and we could not even get the gate generator down without losing 3 mechs.

And our re-drops got sniped with ER weapons in the dropzone. So where is the fun in the whole thing?


We have to take down the OGens and the Omega with inferior weapons with already damaged mechs. Great.


Don´t get me wrong, to get beaten to mush by EVIL is ok, they are one of the best MWO units and we can live with that.

But we could not get an Invasion win in about 15 matches. Even against pure PUG groups. That is just frustraiting.


In the 5 months I play this game now we had one (1!) day where Steiner was attacking an IS Fraction (Marik).

On that day we got our only Tag on a planet for Attacking. Playing vs Inner Sphere Mechs was like "Easy Mode On" and
that is just not right.

An now I read that PGI plans for FP only Clans vs IS? WTF?

If this is true, FP Invasion is really dead.


Sorry for the rant and my bad english. But I had to let some pressure out.

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

I am pretty sure that the bucket solution will be the final nail in the coffin.
It doesn't add anything, it only takes away.
I don't see how that is drawing in a single new or at least returning player.

[justcallme A S H]

Yeah buckets. Might worked, 4 months ago when the idea came up.

But it's almost too little too late now. Balance just got worse, nothing has been addressed.

FP as IS just straight up sucks and Clan is Kodiak ez mode most of the time. I've dropped FP 5-6 times now in like 2 weeks. Even I've lost the motivation.

Edited by justcallme A S H, 20 October 2016 - 10:05 PM.

[BuckshotSchell]

you know they have some really good suggestions in these forums that would drastically increase the quality of CW. Why for the love of god will PGI not take some of these suggestions and use them? It's not just one side complaining either. The clanners want better matches/balance VS IS, and the IS is begging for it!. Does anyone from PGI ever read any of the posts on these forums other than to shut down the ones that might violate the CoC? Even leaving out the lore hounds there are some really great ideas for content or tweeks that would save CW, that would be fairly simple for PGI to implement. If the Devs. would just come out and say "We are taking your suggestions on the forums under consideration, and we will look into what we can and can not do with the current game engine to improve CW to satisfy the community, and get back to all of you shortly." There would be celebrating in the streets! Maybe there will be some great ideas coming out at MechCon, but that is still quite a while off, and meanwhile CW is bleeding out players very quickly.

[SmokeGuar]

First of all, what are these "Clanners" you speaketh of? As far as I can see, most of those voices are actually mercs.

Next, when IS was OP earlier this year, did you complain back then? Because that caused huge number of Clan loyalist to quit.
Major question is this, can you separate faction balance and team balance? Lot of times players, especially newer, have hard time doing so.

Clearly, older players have burned out and new players have difficult time to learn ropes of this mode due to lack of drop chances. What comes to IS units vs Clan "pugs". Many of these pugs actually have 1 to 2 year experience of FW, weather they fly unit tags or not, with decent DC they have advantage against newer players.

Edited by SmokeGuar, 20 October 2016 - 08:59 AM.

[Tarl Cabot]

IS were not "OP", simply large volume of mercs went IS @ about the same time that several mechs became available for c-bills and said units incorporated said mechs in their line up, while also at the same time PGI were playing with the max tonnage, usually favoring IS.

Going from 240 to 265 then reduced to 260 was a HUGE difference in what IS players could bring vs Clan players, primarily due to effective mech availability, with 260 lasting from Jan 2016 til April 2016 with the release of CW/FP Phase 3. You do not think mercs would not cash in on that, leaving Clan Loyalist/pugs to fend for themselves?

Don't forget PGI has not made it easy for Loyalists and mercs for each faction to effectively communicate with each other in the game, 99% of it has to be done outside the game's framework. Though working outside the game is fine for a few, but for a vast number of players having that functionality could be enough get those sitting on the fence more involved.

I could go one but PGI keeps missing the boat after boat. I... never mind... PGI just missed that boat too...

[exiledangel]

my unit finallys gets a 12 man together and the only option is to face 420 or evil from CJF liao is pretty much dead since CJF is now there. Most Davion loyalist units are tired of getting rolled by 420, evils and 3/4 of the mercs world. There is no incentive in FP events to be a loyalist.

[BuckshotSchell]

We Mercs use clan Mech too. I was a clan merc, and we had to play against the other clans to get matches, now I've gone IS for a while and I see why.

[Tavious Grimm]

Because Buckshot, the only thing PGI listens to is Russ and has stated as such. We know ZILCH about this game according to them.

[justcallme A S H]

SmokeGuar, on 20 October 2016 - 08:58 AM, said:

First of all, what are these "Clanners" you speaketh of? As far as I can see, most of those voices are actually mercs.

Next, when IS was OP earlier this year, did you complain back then? Because that caused huge number of Clan loyalist to quit.

Loyalist, merc, what's the difference? Playing population is, playing population. Doesn't matter where you fit in terms of the path you choose.

IS was OP, to a point. But then the whole sequence of events (rescale/Nerf/KDK/IS pilot inability to counter streaks) all in a short space of time blew things up massively as so many of the playing population have covered many, many times.

[xX PUG Xx]

Bud Crue, on 20 October 2016 - 03:35 AM, said:

Wholeheartedly agree. I am looking for an excuse to get back into CW. Apropos, one of the funnest and skilled people I drop with in QP is thinking of starting a new dedicated CW group, but I can't help but think...why bother? As not only does the current playing population suggest we will rarely if ever get matches, but most of us, as once dedicated FRR loyalists who came to this game to play as FRR in phase 2 no longer really have that motivation we once rallied around: "Fight the clan invasion!" "Take back the FRR from the clan!" Now with planets and fronts being essentially arbitrary/dictated by what CJF is up too, we would be playing a mode that most are avoiding, and thus providing less actual matches/play (and less rewards, if that is your thing), for no other reason/motivation than is currently found in QP.

The premise of being focused on FP in a fun and relaxed atmosphere is why I formed [IDI], the core members have all known each other or at least me for years. The problem is that when the only opposition, or at the majority of it, is much higher skilled teams that are only focused on playing the "meta" builds and essentially crushing any opposition then we struggle to find the FUN.

So now we're at the stage 75-80% of our drops are against such units because very few other players choose to play the mode. Unless the changes to FP bring an influx of players, this situation will not be remedied by the "eight planet - one bucket" system as the population spread will remain the same and therefore the list of opponents will remain the same. Obviously the sentiments of the majority of Loyalists is that the new system will not only deter them from returning but it will force more to chose not to play, therefore exacerbating the population problem and leading to the "pro" FP units running over the top of players until there is simply no-one left to fight against.

At this stage I am struggling to find a way to make this better. I've posted multiple suggestions over the years, as have many others, however it seems to either fall on deaf ears or the implementation lacks some sort of "spark of genius" to make it truly good.

I'm beginning to think a reversal to Ph.1 or 2 would actually be preferable.

[Kmieciu]

CW (Invasion / Counter-attack) was a poor design form the get-go.

The only thing that made me play it were the 2 free mechbays per faction. You could get them during the one week contract and then switch to other faction.

You can't make a bad game mode popular just by increasing the rewards. People will just take the rewards and leave.

Edited by Kmieciu, 21 October 2016 - 12:55 AM.

[nagdamnit]

Yep. We moved from clan as the drops were only vs skittles. Were not in any way competitive but even we were struggling to find the fun in playing from clan side.

However, in the last week back, we've found ourselves facing JGx, EVIL, 228 (the remnants of their CW playing side), 420, CPOP in CJF, and MJ12 sitting over with the jags. I've probably left some groups out. All these top tier players farming skittles,day after day.

We kept dropping but there are only so many games you can face like that before it starts to wear everyone down. Inferior players (I've no problem saying I'm not as good as they are), inferior tech, always having to counter attack (we get on when the planet is pretty much 70% turned) and the Battlefield 1 release looks a lot more interesting.

[Aylward]

This seems to aptly describe Phase 1, 2 and 3... and them telling us it's all just fine the whole time.

Bottom Line, if this is the best they can do in 4+ yrs and they can continue to ignore, confound, deceive, ignore and still shamelessly plug new products for sale non-stop as CW continues to spiral downward, all while they continue to say things couldn't be better (save for a few bittervet islanders, ya know), with no change in direction in sight.. What kind of new magic is everyone expecting from these guys at this point ?? Believe me, if they knew how and/or cared, they'd have probably fixed a lot of this by now. Didn't you hear them ? "Programming is hard.....Scheduling is hard"... Which to me is worse then just admitting, "Hey, we never really wanted to do that part and/or don't know how to get there. Listening to the community is just a totally foreign concept when you believe you know what they want better than they do...

Either drink the kool-aid and embrace whatever they feel like letting out between mechpacks or not... They dont really care it seems, because someone is still buying mechpacks.

Cheer up though.. You can pre-order the new Supernova pack to make you feel better.. You should have it just in time for the big bucket clan stomp getting rolling "SOON™". Can I freshen your Kool-Aid ??

Edited by Aylward, 21 October 2016 - 05:03 AM.

[AphexTwin11]

Aylward, on 21 October 2016 - 05:03 AM, said:

"SOON™"

lol that gave me a chuckle