74 replies to this topic

[MisterSomaru]

First off, lemme start off by saying, I'm not really that good at this game. Second off, it's not a lurm hate thread. What this IS, is a dislike on the map, and the average tactics that are used. Due to the size, and the way cover is, it essentially pushes cowardice as a means of play. Rarely do I see my team mates push, even when I ask them to. I wind up doing suicide charges and my team is down an assault. As a brawler, team pushes are essential. If you don't push with your brawlers, you lose brawlers. I just don't like the map for its size and the tactics it seems to force players to take. I REALLY wish maps were chosen at random, with game mode being randomly chosen after the map has been selected.
My two cents. Feel free to hate on me, lol.

[Aggravated Assault Mech]

The map is fine on Domination and even Conquest, since Domination grants some additional cover to fight around, and Conquest tends to shift the fighting out of I8.

In skirmish however, teams tend to meet at I8 where cover is seperated by 400m of open terrain, making pushing basically impossible.

[El Bandito]

It is hard to organize a good push in Puglandia. Your best bet it to wait until the brawling starts--non sense throwing your life early on just cause you have the patience of a gnat.

On the other hand, bringing back random map selection is fine with me.

[MisterSomaru]

El Bandito, on 12 June 2017 - 08:39 PM, said:

It is hard to organize a good push in Puglandia. Your best bet it to wait until the brawling starts--non sense throwing your life early on just cause you have the patience of a gnat.

On the other hand, bringing back random map selection is fine with me.

I will admit to having the patience of a squirrel at times, lol. Conquest and Domination AREN'T as bad, but I still literally prefer every other map.
And the main reason I want random maps is so you simply cannot be immediately stomped by builds that are optimal for that map ON PURPOSE. Like those that stack the odds in their favor specifically for maps that favor their build. I mean, I primarily brawl, in nearly every mech I have. In most maps, forcing a brawl isn't hard. In polar, it's like herding kittens. Oh well.

[JC Daxion]

Aggravated Assault Mech, on 12 June 2017 - 08:30 PM, said:

The map is fine on Domination and even Conquest, since Domination grants some additional cover to fight around, and Conquest tends to shift the fighting out of I8.

In skirmish however, teams tend to meet at I8 where cover is seperated by 400m of open terrain, making pushing basically impossible.

Dom isn't bad?? What are you smoking, this has to be the worse dom map of all.. Maybe alpine but that rarely comes up. I'd rather play any other map/mode than this.. heck i'd rather try to get a PUG to funnel F7 on terra and that's pretty bad



OP: Don't go across the middle of the map, it's no man's land. Go J line, or H line at the least.. But why pugs push the center i'll never know.

El Bandito, on 12 June 2017 - 08:39 PM, said:

On the other hand, bringing back random map selection is fine with me.

Or give us Variant drop decks.. aka you pick your mech, and then get to have a selection of a couple variants to choose once map/mode is chosen. Outside of some omni mechs, you are going to be in a roll anyway, but it would let you tweek it some which would help.

[Kiiyor]

El Bandito, on 12 June 2017 - 08:39 PM, said:

It is hard to organize a good push in Puglandia. Your best bet it to wait until the brawling starts--non sense throwing your life early on just cause you have the patience of a gnat.

This.

If you are facing a LURM heavy team on Polar, a good push is absolutely the best way to win...

...but only if you focus fire.

So it never works in a PUG, unless the planets align and you get someone with the guts to call the drop, and teammates who will actually do what their brave commander says.

So it never works in a PUG.

[xengk]

My only problem with this map is when the team push, they push over hill and get focus fired, instead of using the trenches for cover.

[Xetelian]

I can't stand this map, just had a drop where there were 6+ LRM boats on the enemy team and a few UAVs decimated my team of brawlers and snipers.


This is why people hate LRMs so much, because they get put into situations where there is little or no counter play at all.

If you are an LRM boat, more power too you but can any of you see the severe lack of counter play this map offers? There is like one building to hide behind that isn't good enough for 12 mechs and all the enemy has to do is move around to the sides anyway.



Canyon Network is how Polar should be, deep and lengthy canyons between you and the worst of the LRMs. You can still get killed easily on Canyon Network by LRMs but it isn't nearly as dire as the situation is on polar.



Just like Alpine is for sniping, too much area with little cover. No wonder in polls that I've seen Alpine and Polar are in the bottom of most liked maps.

[Escef]

My only complaint about the map is that it comes up too often. And blaming the map for cowardly play is wrong, players pick the map because they want to play that way. I swear, players in this game would be happier with an old school game boy with Tetris, hanging out with cub scouts. Because then they could play a video game without shooting or being shot at, and camp while doing it. It seems to be what they want.

Edited by Escef, 12 June 2017 - 10:53 PM.

[RogoRogo Wolf]

Polar when introduced was a long awaited big map with diverse terrain and scattered strucures.. and a cold map on top of that!
The only problem was..... diverse and area scattered gameplay for such a map unfortunately never made it into this game

(PGIs single grindzone syndrome... we should introduce a twitter tag for that... maybe we can finally get trough to "hisnameshallnotbementionedtwitteronly".. like #PGISGZS or something... smirk)

So ofc the lack of skyscraper or unnatural terrain feature cover made it the lrm map of choice..... and almost universally hated... shame though..... that could have been the breakout map into the right direction... especially in FW....

[Mister Glitchdragon]

I don't think any of the maps are bad in and of themselves. I just wish there were more of them, so I wouldn't have to play on the same 3 all night. It really burns me out.

This game needs about 6 more maps, pronto.

Also, random map/mode selection, please.

[MisterSomaru]

Kiiyor, on 12 June 2017 - 09:15 PM, said:

This.

If you are facing a LURM heavy team on Polar, a good push is absolutely the best way to win...

...but only if you focus fire.

So it never works in a PUG, unless the planets align and you get someone with the guts to call the drop, and teammates who will actually do what their brave commander says.

So it never works in a PUG.

I can make drop calls on smaller maps, especially when the team drops close together. it's usually easy to get everyone together in a hive mind on those, but Polar is a whole different ballgame. A wasteland of shallow trenches, and LOOONG travel times. it can be much harder to call on that map with good success. Like I've said, LRMs usually aren't the problem for me. I can usually scoot my fatass assaults out of the way soon enough. However, it's just the lack of pushes that get me.

[meteorol]

The map itself is a badly designed map, but the bad design is intensified by the people who vote for Polar.
For the most time, it's LRM bads, and Mech-jedis (people who think the best way to use their ER-LL lightsabres is scratching off paint from 1600m).
Whenever Polar is picked, you can be sure that a considerable margin of players has a gameplan that is either

• Sit behind a hill and beg for locks
  
• Don't get closer to the enemy than 1000m

Now, if the majority of Polar voters end up on one team, the match will be over rather quickly. Either the Polar voters team gets rushed and curbstomped 0:12, or (like most of the time in QP because of lack of organisation) they poke and rain the other team to death and win.


What usually happens though, is that the matchmaker spreads both LRM bads and Mech-Jedis equally above both teams, which means both teams have around 1/3 to 1/2 players that will absolutely not push, ever, no matter what happens. This leads to the 10+ min polar stalemates that are decided by slow attrition with zero movement on both sides.

This match here i played on my alt is a good example for it:



Some odd LRM builds on both sides (LRM dire, LRM hbr etc) and plenty of ER LL lead to both teams unwillingness to push a around hill line, because both teams expected atleast 1/3 of their team not to participate in a push. Both teams basically were almost within one map square, with two hill lines between them (and a whole lot of f*cking LOD popping terrain, that lead to me easily waste 1/4 of my damage on not rendered terrain, fix this sh*t pgi!!!!!) and sat there for like 8 minutes with zero movement.

Edited by meteorol, 12 June 2017 - 11:42 PM.

[Weeny Machine]

I dislike the map, to put it mildly. There are stretches which are open which means you have to cross open terrain to get at the enemy. Considering the extreme ranges of energy weapons you get so many hits that you are really shot up afterwards. Therefore you see mostly stupid "trench warfare" on this map - a dull boring snipefest decorated with some LRM cream.

It also lacks different elevations which can be used by jump capable mech. This make the map so monotonous that it bores the sh** out of me. I wonder why it comes up that often. Most likely people like it simple

Edit: and even if a trench leads me to my enemy, I have to walk for ages to get there because it is, of course, no direct path. Exposing myself to cut the distance is a no-go as mentioned above

Edited by Bush Hopper, 13 June 2017 - 01:16 AM.

[Shifty McSwift]

Try to show your QP puglandian friends the trenches that run across most of the map, it may be the polar highlands, but there's plenty of lowland that can be utilised.

Again the problem comes in with getting randoms to notice this and follow or utilise them, but many of the more central valleys run in almost circular paths that are almost guaranteed to get you up close and personal.

[MisterSomaru]

... This is probably the most civil and articulated "I hate polar" thread I've seen. Backed up by well documented experiences... It's nice.

One other major concern I have is the slog it takes to get to your enemies. I can set myself to max speed, go make a sandwich, come back, and ask if I missed anything.

[Vellron2005]

If you are a short to mid-range brawler on Polar Highlands, stick with your team and just wait. Eventually, somebody on the enemy team will do just what you usually do - charge headlong into danger. And then all hell breaks loose, and you can do your thing.

if you go in alone, you will only get sniped and LRM'd to death in seconds.

I admire you understand that you are not very good at this game. If you were, you would develop firstly, patience, secondly, a play style that includes all-range builds.

This game used to be played on small maps and people lulled them selves into direct-fire close up brawls, but with the advent of more realistic maps like Polar, new types of engagements need to be adopted. You can't just roll in an all-SRM build and expect to get HPG every time.

Adjust your builds accordingly.

The world will not adapt to you. You need to adapt to the world.

[Karl Streiger]

meteorol, on 12 June 2017 - 11:40 PM, said:

(and a whole lot of f*cking LOD popping terrain, that lead to me easily waste 1/4 of my damage on not rendered terrain, fix this sh*t pgi!!!!!) and sat there for like 8 minutes with zero movement.

QFT
this seems to be a serious issue for projectile weapons like PPCs and sluggs - LBX and Laser don't seem to have so much issues.
Considering other strange behavior of PPCs - the terrain clipping is bad.
Were a laser hit the target the PPC does not.(did test it in training grounds - with both weapons in the same location (BattleMaster)

[Ced Riggs]

With many pugs having all chat and voip deactivated, barely able to point a crosshair, overheating on colder maps despite having two specced coolshots, and generly disregarding drop calls, polar excacerbates it all, because polar has little room to let few players carry. The better together team wins, and every shadow cat sniper, lurm scorch and scaredyfoot ac2 spammer is a detriment.

But, such is life in puglandia.

[MisterSomaru]

Vellron2005, on 13 June 2017 - 01:24 AM, said:

If you are a short to mid-range brawler on Polar Highlands, stick with your team and just wait. Eventually, somebody on the enemy team will do just what you usually do - charge headlong into danger. And then all hell breaks loose, and you can do your thing.

if you go in alone, you will only get sniped and LRM'd to death in seconds.

I admire you understand that you are not very good at this game. If you were, you would develop firstly, patience, secondly, a play style that includes all-range builds.

This game used to be played on small maps and people lulled them selves into direct-fire close up brawls, but with the advent of more realistic maps like Polar, new types of engagements need to be adopted. You can't just roll in an all-SRM build and expect to get HPG every time.

Adjust your builds accordingly.

The world will not adapt to you. You need to adapt to the world.

Yeah... Working on it though!
edit: I've only been playing for a few weeks, so I still have a lot to learn... And I need a better PC, lol.

Edited by MrSomaru, 13 June 2017 - 01:45 AM.