142 replies to this topic

[Kudzu]

}{avoc, on 16 December 2011 - 10:56 AM, said:

You may have also heard it referred to as "waves", "reinforcements" or "the rest".

No respawn has its place, but those matches last either 5 minutes or 5 hours. Spending 2 hours in an assault 'Mech trying to track down the other team because they have run to a corner of a massive map and hidden is not my idea of a good time.

And those same people keep coming back in waves, huh? Good to know.

You realize that there are this wonderful things called "objectives" that you can put it to stop camping, right? In fact, you can even make them the entire focus while having killing the other side be secondary.

[TheRulesLawyer]

Omigir, on 16 December 2011 - 11:16 AM, said:

Funny story in COD, in the hardcore matches where you can die and wait a timmer before your at it again. (no more then like 15 seconds if you miss a wave) Camping is rampent. Allot of people camp. Most of the people camp. Partly becuase maybe that only a few shots kill and you can kill some one as they run by more often or not before said running target can turn, aquire and fire. On that same mark, i just shoot rockets into corners after i got killed there and solve said problem.

But in regular matches, where you can respawn instantly, few people camp. This is becuase a person is harder to kill in regular and there is always a map up. So its hard to pin down, do people camp in hard core becuase its easy to kill them, hard to find them or becuase they are afraid of dying?

I've found that camping is a risk-adverse behavior. That is people doing it general feel like they are less likely to die that way. Its opposed to something that is driven by getting the max points, or capping points etc.

The more that is at risk (long time till respawn, no respawn, loss of stuff) the more campy players get. Especially as you go down in skill.

[Omigir]

TheRulesLawyer, on 16 December 2011 - 11:36 AM, said:

I've found that camping is a risk-adverse behavior. That is people doing it general feel like they are less likely to die that way. Its opposed to something that is driven by getting the max points, or capping points etc.

The more that is at risk (long time till respawn, no respawn, loss of stuff) the more campy players get. Especially as you go down in skill.

I am going to venture and say (in COD) it is not risk of loss, as you loose the same thing between regular and hardcore. (10 seconds is not long, and usualy you catch a wave and only wait maybe 4 or 5?)

I am going to say its probably more likely the ease of killing, if you sit in a corner and you pop 3 shots into some one and they dont drop, you now risk them turning on you and killing you because they are moving, you are statinoary and easier to shoot in the head now.

Just from what I have seen in COD in reguards to COD.

Its not like we have not seen jump snipers or indirect fire arty boats that go for the cheapest trick in the book just to get high number of kills to do well in a match. Or stip off all the leg armor off thier mechs to make for more room to up lethal punch in order to get hte most kills they can before they get blown up becuase they have NO ARMOR ON THIER LEGS. no, these things have never happend in a mechwarrior game with multiple and fast respawns.

[TheRulesLawyer]

Well you don't actually lose anything, but you still lose if you get my meaning. People don't like losing even if nothing is on the line. See people go on about their precious K:D ratio.

Edited by TheRulesLawyer, 16 December 2011 - 11:59 AM.

[Nik Van Rhijn]

I'll just be happy to get a K:D ratio

[Omigir]

I think K:D ratio is probably not going to be incentive as a coward has great K:D.

but why are the devs going to have incentive if its not going to be enough to bring players out of thier camping tactics? Also, if K:D is not enough to bring people around, Campers are going to camp, respawn or not. Perma Mech or not. just like there will always be alpha strike boats and missle boats and jump snipers. I bet there is a cannon variant for each.

So instead of arguing if there should be respawn or not, why not think of a way that it could work and keep the team together like the topic was asking.

[Nik Van Rhijn]

I have been trying for several weeks and so far have been unable to come up with any reason other than "i don't want to wait more than 5 seconds for anything"

[TheRulesLawyer]

Nik Van Rhijn, on 16 December 2011 - 12:13 PM, said:

I have been trying for several weeks and so far have been unable to come up with any reason other than "i don't want to wait more than 5 seconds for anything"

Eh? I think maybe you answered the wrong question. 5 seconds isn't a problem. Every 5 minutes isn't a huge issue even though its annoying. When its 10-15-20 minutes it gets old quick.

To get back the original topic, I'm favoring a limited respawn at this point.
You die, you go into a queue to get back in. A dropship lands and drops off reinforcements every couple of minutes. Every time you respawn you pay for repairs, ammo, etc. Make each player have a limited amount of drops per mission. It'd eliminate that lucky early game death that has you waiting a real long time. Some limited reinforcements aren't unreasonable from a realism standpoint. Also it would push the game a little toward capturing an objective as you wouldn't be able to just kill everyone off an win as easy. Knocking most of them out and capping the objective while they wait for the drop would be more viable.

[Omigir]

TheRulesLawyer, on 16 December 2011 - 01:19 PM, said:

Eh? I think maybe you answered the wrong question. 5 seconds isn't a problem. Every 5 minutes isn't a huge issue even though its annoying. When its 10-15-20 minutes it gets old quick.

To get back the original topic, I'm favoring a limited respawn at this point.
You die, you go into a queue to get back in. A dropship lands and drops off reinforcements every couple of minutes. Every time you respawn you pay for repairs, ammo, etc. Make each player have a limited amount of drops per mission. It'd eliminate that lucky early game death that has you waiting a real long time. Some limited reinforcements aren't unreasonable from a realism standpoint. Also it would push the game a little toward capturing an objective as you wouldn't be able to just kill everyone off an win as easy. Knocking most of them out and capping the objective while they wait for the drop would be more viable.

I do like this. Dropships can also stop spawn killing via ppc/gauss fire. And if a landing zone is over run, invading/defending forces can be pushed to an alternate landing zone perhaps? All the same. I like the above sugestion.

[CaveMan]

I still like the repair bays idea better, but the dropship thing could be doable.

My only question is, how do you handle the whole reinforcements thing when it comes to salvage and 'Mech ownership? If the other team's Atlas spawns five times, and my team wins, do I get a shot at salvaging one Atlas or five? For that matter what if somebody only barely has the c-bills to buy a new 'Mech, do they get unlimited spawns of it when they enter a match? Because I don't really like that idea. It sort of negates the concept of resource management behind having an economy.

[Omigir]

CaveMan, i run under the assumption (not that i support this) that under this game type,there are perma mechs and no slavage.

[TheRulesLawyer]

CaveMan, on 16 December 2011 - 01:35 PM, said:

I still like the repair bays idea better, but the dropship thing could be doable.

My only question is, how do you handle the whole reinforcements thing when it comes to salvage and 'Mech ownership? If the other team's Atlas spawns five times, and my team wins, do I get a shot at salvaging one Atlas or five? For that matter what if somebody only barely has the c-bills to buy a new 'Mech, do they get unlimited spawns of it when they enter a match? Because I don't really like that idea. It sort of negates the concept of resource management behind having an economy.

I don't think salvaging whole mech would be a good thing for the game, but honestly its a huge question and there is a big thread on mech destruction vs permaownership. Only once you know the answer to that, can you answer this question.

Edited by TheRulesLawyer, 16 December 2011 - 01:43 PM.

[Nevoeiro]

I like the dropship idea. And better yet, make an option where the players can choose the number of drops available for a match. (like 1, 3 or 5 drops for example).

[Phades]

Omigir, on 16 December 2011 - 01:26 PM, said:

I do like this. Dropships can also stop spawn killing via ppc/gauss fire. And if a landing zone is over run, invading/defending forces can be pushed to an alternate landing zone perhaps? All the same. I like the above sugestion.

At that point it should be a skunk out rule and end the match. They capped your base, its GG and move on. Objective based games should be objective and resource focused. Kill based games should just be focused on who and what dies in which order and when there is nothing left on one side, be done with it.

[Skarr]

TheRulesLawyer, on 15 December 2011 - 10:00 AM, said:

You get your first drop.
Dave has a brawler and zergs the front line and dies in a blaze of glory 3 minutes in.
John and Paul have moderate config and die 8-15 minutes in.
Rick has been running a back line support mech and is one of the last to die 17 minutes in.

Dave got bored during the 14minutes between him dying and Rick dying and now has wandered off watching TV/Fixing dinner/Browsing the web or worse, jumped in another game.

Either John or Paul are probably doing the same as Dave, but not yet in a game.

You spend another 15 minutes herding cats to get everyone back in the game lobby so you can have another shot.

In a no-respawn game with reasonably long rounds this is the sort of stuff that happens all the freaking time when playing with a group. Its unreasonable to expect people to sit around patiently while you get out at the end of the game. You end up playing much less time than you spend waiting and they whole thing is just frustrating.

I fail to see how respawn changes your situation since dave obviously likes getting up close and personal meaning that when he spawns again at the 5 min mark he going straight back into the fray only to get blown up again or it could just be an enemy mech that snuck past your teammates and gets in some lucky shots. Meanwhile both those he plays with and the opponents have their respawns so he has to wait longer than before since the rest aren't dead.

Having drop limits is either going to be too restrictive meaning everyone can't play what they want or it's not restrictive and it's not going to matter, besides with their talk of choosing a role you should not be forced into a mech class you don't want to play as.

[John Clavell]

Massive assumptions are being made towards why respawn or no-respawn is better or worse without knowing how the games mechanics will work. How big will the maps be? How will pilot and merc corp inventory work? Also how will the three different game types (Lone Wolf, Faction, and Merc Corp) effect the game types?

When is No-Respawn good? If anyone here has played in NBT or other past planetary leagues, where you have finite amounts of mechs and resources, and once a mech is destroyed in a match it's destroyed for good. You'll understand the strategic and value based gameplay it generates. Like in EVE Online. If you have something to lose and must take a risk then the reward is greater. It seems plausible at least that the 'Merc Corp' gameplay will be something along these lines. The overtones from PGI thus far have been about a world of consequences, and resources.

The developers are aiming for a 20 minutes time frame on battles. If you consider larger maps, with single objective based play for Merc Corp matches then respawn does not make much sense. I think it's a safe bet to assume that Merc Corps will only a limited amount of Battlemechs and repair capability. Also lets consider that as the attacker you should have technically less resources than the defender of a garrison planet either in Battlemechs or infrastructure. If a map is respawn in this instance then burning through your Battlemech inventory is pretty weak gameplay and and breaks the immersion. Furthermore, being able to repair your Battlemechs in an instant is immersion breaking. Finally, and this is where we talk about 'splitting the team, single objective maps (destroy enemy forces, and or do x y z) means anyone who re-spawns does so with their team, which ruins tactical play, or at their DZ, which means your forces get strung out and picked off.

So where does respawn work? When you look at 'Faction' gameplay it seems more plausible. The houses have much large reserves of Battlemechs, resources, money and more dropships available. It's less of an immersion breaker. But I think the key point comes down to catering for different gameplay and players. As you move from Faction players to lone wolves teams become less organised and smaller. Multi-objective game types, something like Team Fortress 2 work as a good example. There is still a bunch of tactical play, but it's a lot more friendly to random less organised play.

It seems to me Merc Corp is about team vs team tactical combat. Resources matter, and are finite. It's more organised in general and caters towards the hardcore players. Assuming it's single objective maps then non-respawn is a much better fit. If it's multi-objective game play then still no-spawn is viable but depends more on overall game design mechanics and map size. We'd also need to see how resource management works, how deployment works and so on.

Faction play seems to encourage the hardcore, mid core, casual gameplay, and might be similar to Merc Corp play in many ways. I see the bulk of players in the game being here. But also there will be a large spread of organised to less organised teams of different sizes. The fact the devs talked about what type of worlds you'll be able to attack based on being in a Merc Corp or a Faction for example seems to support the assumption of different play styles across the three types of player groups. Faction play might be something a bit closer to Battlefield of Team Fortress Capture Point. How resource management will play into this still is unknown. But there is certainly room for both respawn and no respawn.

Finally you have Solaris type play. Which works again with Respawn or no respawn. Smaller maps means that both work well. This supports casual play, meaning you can get into a game fast.

[Nik Van Rhijn]

An excellent exposition of the position as it stands.

[MaddMaxx]

Nik Van Rhijn, on 17 December 2011 - 06:05 AM, said:

An excellent exposition of the position as it stands.

I agree with Nik's assessment of a fellow John's description of how it all may play out. Good one John.

[TheRulesLawyer]

I fail to see how your assumptions are any less massive John. I'd be happy enough to see the merc battles be no respawn and the house battles have respawn though. If nothing else it gives both groups of players a place to play where they can affect the world instead of leaving one group to "instant battle" mode. More fun for everyone = we all win.

[MaddMaxx]

TheRulesLawyer, on 19 December 2011 - 09:05 AM, said:

I fail to see how your assumptions are any less massive John. I'd be happy enough to see the merc battles be no respawn and the house battles have respawn though. If nothing else it gives both groups of players a place to play where they can affect the world instead of leaving one group to "instant battle" mode. More fun for everyone = we all win.

Everyone is pretty much assuming everything at this time. With very few exceptions. If one agrees with one assumption over another, in the end the result will be the same. Some assumptions will prove correct while other will not.

Is it Wednesday yet?