348 replies to this topic

[SuperFunkTron]

MovinTarget, on 26 January 2017 - 06:53 AM, said:

Would *LOVE* to see a series of FP-oriented Academy training/trial scenarios added though:
"How to open a door (hint, DO NOT SHOOT THE DOOR)"
"How to kill and O-Gen"
"How to kill Omega"
Conversely, but perhaps not as easy to teach:
"How to defend an O-gen"

Those FP basics would themselves be a great gate for FP. If they gated off a small area of the academy so they had to open it to get to the generators with that captain explaining things along the way would be a huge benefit. Also give that captain a nagging reminder telling the players to make sure they listen, plan, and actively coordinate in FP if they want to survive.

[Jumping Gigolo]

The roundtable should at least include representatives from prominent and active CW merc units. Here are 10 which i have in mind:

1. EVIL

2. MJ12

3. KCOM

4. IREX

5. WDMC

6. DERP

7. D'C

8. 228

9. -BO-

10. 54MR

for the loyalist units:

a.) 420 for CJF

b.) 07/Bacon for SJ

c.) BNB for CGB

d.) RCW for CW

e.) ISEN for FRR

f.) SROT for Steiner

g.) HHoD for Davion

h.) TCAF for Liao

i.) NS for Kurita

j.) any mother pugger who can speak for Marik

Edited by Jumping Gigolo, 26 January 2017 - 08:04 AM.

[MovinTarget]

Dunno if [IDI] "ranks" but we play a lot of FP, just switched back to Merc after a loyalist stint with DCMS so we've literally played every way except clan loyalist in the past few months...

[MovinTarget]

Kyrs, on 26 January 2017 - 07:24 AM, said:

FactionPlay question ONLY:

1) Will the drop deck tonnages be adjusted with the "player win/loss+ unit win/loss ration"?. ( This should prevent T1 player of using bonus tonnage intended for T5. )

2) Will the kill bounty be adjusted to the value of the player skill?. ( Killing an Evil player in FW should give you larger amount of c-bill that an T5. )

Not 100% sure either is advisable as incentive... I mean, I can see on the clan side, by lore you could argue "good clanners can get it done with less", but I'm not sure they would like that... reward...

Start making head-hunting rewardable will make poorly disciplined players worse and possibly drive some good player to not play as much because they get intentionally targeted.

...having said that... it would be a really neat thing in a game to point out the highest *targetable* threat on the enemy team at that moment. Make him different on the HUD or give us an alternate button to click to auto-target them or even just the target our DC is targeting... when I mean highest threat, I mean the guy in this game right now, hurting our team the most. It only shows up on your HUD if he is targetable under normal circumstances...

Edited by MovinTarget, 26 January 2017 - 08:28 AM.

[Desintegrator]

Maybe there will be something new ??

[Tryh4rd3r]

I think the pre roundtable was pretty spot on in terms of idetifying the primary issues with faction play with on major exception. The number one issue they missed is full Premades being placed in to matches against PUG groups.

The end result is almost always the pugs getting steam rolled 12-48. It's not fun for the PUGS and I can't believe it's genuinely fun for the promenades.

I have played this game on and off over the years (wish I could remember the login for my original account) and just came back this year and brought a couple friends. The all around consensus has been that Faction Warfare is just not worth playing because if you run solo you just get run over by premades then spawn camped all day and if you run as a decent sized group you just steam roll the other side which is more rewarding but just as boring.

The reality is that even a crappy premade will win 90% of the time and a good one will always win. this problem is compunded by the fact that given this games player population if there are any premades in the queue on the opposing faction you are pretty much bound to encounter them as a pug because they have a full group which fills the other side of the match quickly so the match maker takes them and then try's to fill your side as quickly as possible and .... the fastest way to fill it is to grab 12 pugs.

The optimal solution would likely be to only place premades again other premades/have separate queue's but I doubt there are enough players to support this,but I can tell you for sure that the worst solution is to ignore the issue which is what the members of the pre round table mostly did. Getting rolled by premades drives new player away from what should be the coolest and most engaging aspect of this game and also from the game as a whole.

MWO desperately needs more players and doing what it takes to make the game modes more welcoming to new players should be the number 1 priority.

[maxdest]

Suggestion for domination in FP:

- Change the way timer behaves so that team with most players in area counts down (max 6 players)
- In conjunction , raise the timer to 5 mins, and slightly increase area.

This would make domination a longer more satisfying brawly type mode.

[MovinTarget]

maxdest, on 26 January 2017 - 12:50 PM, said:

Suggestion for domination in FP:

- Change the way timer behaves so that team with most players in area counts down (max 6 players)
- In conjunction , raise the timer to 5 mins, and slightly increase area.

This would make domination a longer more satisfying brawly type mode.

Agree, make it more of a tug-of-war where the team with more people in the circle will push the countdown...

[sierra gulf]

Tarogato, on 26 January 2017 - 01:30 AM, said:

Another thing you could do is provide a C-Bill price reduction to mechs tied to your faction in lore.

An idea similar to this I have kicked around a little in my head for a few months now is to instead give reward bonuses for using a faction appropriate mech in a FP match. This would have the benefit of rewarding people who already own a given mech and could be limited to benefiting people actually playing in FP, if that is desirable. Perhaps scaling the rewards according to the competitiveness of the chassis and the number of chassis associated with the faction.

[James Argent]

They don't need to add a separate area of the Academy to practice gate/gen/Omega kills, they just need to close the gates and activate the gens/Omega on the existing Invasion-specific practice maps. Turn on the turrets too, if you want...or make this a selectable option in the lobby. This would benefit both new players who want to see what they're getting into without dooming a real drop and units who want to train via private lobby. The FP warning box can be updated to mention this feature.

[Marius Romanis]

6 differently quirked bonus mechs for 6 different IS factions................................ DOES NO ONE SEE THAT WILL THROW BALANCE MORE INTO IMPOSSIBILITY THAN ANYTHING ELSE EVER, either 1 option/factions mech will always be the meta one or they will all be **** and not incentivising to the Roleplayers. Its a terrible idea. mech balance is best it has ever been, focus on player balancing.

[SuperFunkTron]

CadoAzazel, on 26 January 2017 - 02:54 PM, said:

6 differently quirked bonus mechs for 6 different IS factions................................ DOES NO ONE SEE THAT WILL THROW BALANCE MORE INTO IMPOSSIBILITY THAN ANYTHING ELSE EVER, either 1 option/factions mech will always be the meta one or they will all be **** and not incentivising to the Roleplayers. Its a terrible idea. mech balance is best it has ever been, focus on player balancing.

Would you care to explain how adding a strength and corresponding weakness to mechs would completely destroy balance? The idea is not for every mech to be the ultimate weakness to each of its enemies. The idea is to facilitate the creation of roles and provide incentive to use them. We currently have a 2 bucket system. If you have 6 potential types of quirked abilities (I want to emphasize positive and negative quirks for the sake of balance, those quirks can be combined among the IS houses to help them combat the Clans which will have their set of balanced quirks. That sounds a hell of a lot more interesting, even if it will require some on the fly balancing to make sure nothing becomes to powerful. At the very least, "meta" will be disrupted and each faction will be known for doing something a little better than others and also something a little worse than others.

I see a lot of incentive for role players, people who enjoy lore, and new comers who need some sort of direction when they first arrive in FP. Right now its overwhelming when people jump into FP and have so many different things they need to focus on and are hearing completely contradictory information from different groups trying to teach them "their" way. This would at least organize "ways" so they know what kind of play style they should be thinking of when starting to buy and build mechs.

[Neput Z34]

Will the near future "balance" decisions be based around "meta monetization"?

[Vincent Quatermain]

CadoAzazel, on 26 January 2017 - 02:54 PM, said:

6 differently quirked bonus mechs for 6 different IS factions................................ DOES NO ONE SEE THAT WILL THROW BALANCE MORE INTO IMPOSSIBILITY THAN ANYTHING ELSE EVER, either 1 option/factions mech will always be the meta one or they will all be **** and not incentivising to the Roleplayers. Its a terrible idea. mech balance is best it has ever been, focus on player balancing.

I don't think the bonuses are likely to be that large -- and it doesn't matter since a team of good players is vastly more important than any attributes of the mechs. It does throw a bone to the Loyalists though, which is badly needed.

Player balancing could be helped by a couple suggestions in the pre-roundtable:

1) Ban trial mechs and/or people with less than X games played.
2) IN-GAME TOOLS for unit recruitment and search
3) Unit owned mechs

[Vincent Quatermain]

IDEAS FOR FACTION QUIRKS:

Version One:
Create a special Skill Tree that you can only earn points for in Faction Play. The tree is the same for everyone, as are the number of skill points awarded per FP match (varying by wins and match score). However for Loyalists, certain branches of the tree will be cheaper for a particular faction. Thus, there is no imbalance in the long run, it's just easier to build up in a certain direction in the short run.

Version Two:
As above, except certain portions of the Faction Play Skill Tree are only available to faction Loyalists. Any points spent on faction exclusive skills are lost if you leave the faction. This has more flavor, but could create balance concerns.

Personally, I think either one of these would be interesting.

I also like the idea that pay bonuses for the three types will work like this:

Lone Wolf -- Get a small bonus win or lose
Mercenary -- Get a large bonus on win only
Loyalist -- Get a medium bonus on loss, large bonus on win

I also like the idea of a Hazard Pay Bonus where if your PSR is lower than the average PSR of the enemy team, you get bonus c-bills win or lose.

[SuperFunkTron]

Vincent Quatermain, on 26 January 2017 - 04:16 PM, said:

IDEAS FOR FACTION QUIRKS:


Version Two:
As above, except certain portions of the Faction Play Skill Tree are only available to faction Loyalists. Any points spent on faction exclusive skills are lost if you leave the faction. This has more flavor, but could create balance concerns.

I also like the idea that pay bonuses for the three types will work like this:

Lone Wolf -- Get a small bonus win or lose
Mercenary -- Get a large bonus on win only
Loyalist -- Get a medium bonus on loss, large bonus on win

I also like the idea of a Hazard Pay Bonus where if your PSR is lower than the average PSR of the enemy team, you get bonus c-bills win or lose.

I like the 2nd idea a lot. The only downside to it that I see is that players new to FP aren't going to have those quirks to help them ease in. As much as I would love to have the quirks be rewarded, I am more concerned about increasing and retaining population.

The idea of the hazard pay is also seems like good incentive for loyalists and reasonable for mercs. If we are aiming to minimize lone wolf population this is probably one of the best ideas I've read so far.

[Ryoken]

To bring balance to faction play the problems caused by big merc units switching to the flavour of the patch tech needs to be adressed.

The option to alternate between IS and Clan tech also is an benefit for itself as merc pilots can make full use of all their mechs in the mechlab compared to pilots choosing a loyalist career that can only use half of their mechs in faction warfare (Clan or IS).

The reasons above draw more and more of active players with well equipped mech labs into merc units causing more balance problems due to the mobility of those large groups to switch to whatever faction they want.

Maybe merc units should get less rewards or be limited to fewer players to compensate for their flexibility and problematic balancing?

Or maybe allow a Clan Carrer and an IS Carrer per account so players owning mechs of both tech factions are not forced into merc units if they want to use all of their mechs?

---

To balance IS VS Clan tech the big differences of how XL engines work should get adressed. If IS XL engines would get destroyed at 5 engine hits instead of 3 the loss of an side torso would not instakill IS mechs and makes them more like Clan thus easier to balance.

Yet this would make the introduction of light fusion problematic as they would render standard engines pointless if they would as well take 5 hits to be destroyed (loss of both side torsi possible). And if they would be destroyed after 3 or 4 engine hits taken the light fusion engine itself is pointless...

---

To give incentive for smaller units to play in faction warfare cluster the MC earnings generated by a conquered planet in 5% clusters and distribute it according to units that conquered the planet.

So if:
Unit 1 conquered 50% points
Unit 2 conquered 25% points
Unit 3 conquered 12% points
Unit 4 conquered 06% points
Unit 5 conquered 03% points
Unit 6 conquered 02% points
Unit 7 conquered 01% points
Unit 8 conquered 01% points
The actual system afaik would reward:
Unit 2 - 8 with 0%MC
Unit 1 with 100%MC

while a system generating spread income according to conquered points with a minimum threashold of 5% conquered points would reward:
Unit 5 - 8 with 0%MC (below 5% threshold)
Unit 4 with 05%MC
Unit 3 with 10%MC
Unit 2 with 25%MC
Unit 1 with 50%MC + remaining MC from rounding up/down and/or below 5% threshold

---

Also maybe let us buy camo patterns and decals that are shared within the unit? Maybe with dayly, weekly, monthly C-Bill rent rates according to unit player count?

Edited by Ryoken, 26 January 2017 - 04:54 PM.

[SuperFunkTron]

In regards to Faction Specific Mechs, I found this in the forums. I'm not sure if there are resources that could update the info to the exact time frame PGI wants to implement with the timeline advancement, but it provides a solid start for where we're at now. A decision to eventually apply those Faction Specific Mech bonuses and even Faction Quirks to a specific chassis or variant (or even all mechs) could be made from the data here.

Odanan, on 27 June 2012 - 10:48 AM, said:

Assignment tables:

Spoiler

MWO IS mechs (year 3039):

Notes:

• The second Draconis Combine column is for Kurita A rated units (they have much more old Star League stuff).
  
• The Mauler in the table is the earlier Dabuku (the Mauler itself is produced only in 3048, but would quickly replace the Dabuku and become a mainstay in DCM).
  
• The Wolfhound variants, by 3039, are basically prototypes. The standard Wolfhound is produced in 3052.
  
• The Black Knight is very rare by 3039, but resumes production in 3052.

Extra IS mechs (strong candidates that can be added any moment):




And the Clans, 3050 (invading force):

Info compiled from here. (thanks to Sennin for the original link).

[Jon McFuzzy]

Everyone has provided excellent inputs, some are very specific which PGI can look at. Please allow me to share some high level suggestion as well, and apologies if these have been posted earlier :

1. Give players - INCLUDING Loyalist - sense of excitement to play FP (other than stomping other robots - which can be fulfilled by QP). Add DEPTH. Stories. Drama. Politics and twist. Reasons that make people willing to queue and group up enthusiastically. Look at the The Witcher series - essentially it is monster slashing over and over again - but what makes it Best Game of The Year? If PGI can answer this question, if PGI is aiming to be one of the best online game, they'll know what to do for FP.

3. Make FP a place for everybody that people can enjoy - either winning or losing. Sorry - I do not subscribe to the idea that only (highly) skilled players should play FP. Yes it can be like egg-and-chicken argument between MM and population, but you have to start somewhere. Infantry is the biggest component in real wars - not special forces. Everybody should have the chance to contribute to a common goal - Win and pride for the faction. A bump for noobs skill is certainly important - so as part of this idea, PGI needs to revamp Training and Academy as well.

4. Improve in-game and in-client communication and collaboration. Make it a lot easier for people to group up, communicate and coordinate before launching. Not everybody is using TS (even though it is ideal).

5. FIX the (annoying) BUGs please.

[Marius Romanis]

FP/CW
lower Cbills for damage done and increase cbills for assists in formation etc
Majorly increase finishing game by objective bonus's linked to how quickly you do the objectives (1st 5 mins win __ cbills) 1st 15 < that 1st 5 etc
If you dont do above, increase IS cbill income and not Clan coz clans are designed to do more damage IS designed to take more damage therefore IS do less damage therefore they should get more cbills for damage done ?