465 replies to this topic

[Dark Wooki33 IIC]

Hmm ... this thing is still alive.

Wasnt their already a conclusion that people who get spawnkilled, made some grave mistakes prior?

But ... keep on discussing, while i wait in my medium for the opfor dropship to send me moar meat!

Joking aside actual their is a problem with spawns on the siege maps, most attacker spawns are to open, especially boreal vault is pretty stupid. Always turns into a turkeyshoot with agressive defenders.

Sneakedit: On some maps the spawns are also to close to each other, in certain game modes. Tourmaline comes to mind.

Edited by Dark Wooki33 IIC, 07 August 2017 - 11:50 PM.

[50 50]

How about.... if a team hides in their drop zone, after a certain period of time the Escort AI drops in and stomps his way out of the DZ yelling over the comms "Do you maggots want to live for ever!!!"

[Dark Wooki33 IIC]

50 50, on 07 August 2017 - 11:51 PM, said:

How about.... if a team hides in their drop zone, after a certain period of time the Escort AI drops in and stomps his way out of the DZ yelling over the comms "Do you maggots want to live for ever!!!"

I cant see this working.

Most people dont even listen to a good plan, so y should they listen to an ai atlas mocking them?
They already feel bad (or atleast they should) for hiding in their spawn in the first place.

[50 50]

Dark Wooki33 IIC, on 07 August 2017 - 11:55 PM, said:

I cant see this working.

Most people dont even listen to a good plan, so y should they listen to an ai atlas mocking them?
They already feel bad (or atleast they should) for hiding in their spawn in the first place.

Not to worry.
Was just me having a joke.

[Jaroth Corbett]

Mycroft000, on 07 August 2017 - 07:58 PM, said:

You're right, they would still lose. I'm not arguing that.

I also don't think that PGI is willing or capable of changing things in a sensible way.

That's why I argue for the cessation of shooting pugs as they fall from the drop ship. If units want to use that tactic against each other, go for it, they're on a level playing field. But when we're wanting to have a booming population in FP, why should we expect that the use of tactics that has the potential to drive away new blood would be beneficial to the game we want to grow?

I know that there are those who can't be swayed, but for those who can, why shouldn't we as a community band together and agree to rules of engagement that lead to more engaging fun gameplay instead of continuing to abuse a poorly designed system?

Edit: Grammar

So you don't mind the spawn camping as long as it is not done against pugs??????????? I am a bit confused here.

Mycroft000, on 07 August 2017 - 10:33 PM, said:

1. I've suggested destructible drop ships many times so far, I fail to see how the drop ships should be immune to damage but the mechs waiting to drop can be killed before they have any level of autonomy.

2. I intended the question to be a bit absurd in that situations where spawn camping of an entire team is taking place should cause the team being camped to automatically lose the match. There is no reason to subject 24 players to a waiting game of drop ships flying individuals in to be killed before they touch the ground.

And I do stand by my belief that any game that has spawn camping as a viable mechanic is using poor/lazy game design and has room for improvement and increased depth through further development. I referenced Richard Garfield's book because there should be a tattered and well read copy on every game developer's shelf.

OK the point is you asked for an example from the lore & I have given it. You can keep saying that ALL the games that have spawn camping in them have poor design but like I said, ALL those games are poorly designed? Really?.......................................OK

Leggin Ho, on 07 August 2017 - 09:35 PM, said:

Show me anywhere in the "Lore" were after a mech is blown apart the pilots drops in a new shiny one and I'm sure we could find one.

Does it specifically have to be blown apart or would disabled work for you as well? If you are trying to make the point that after a Battlemech pilot has lost a mech he does not get a new one in the same battle, I can quote you from the lore to show where that happens.

[Mycroft000]

I've said before in this thread, if two organized units are fighting each other and want to abuse a poorly designed game mechanic, they are free to do so. But if we want to encourage people to join the game mode and move toward it being a thriving side of the game we can all get instant drops in all the time, then discontinuing the abuse of a poorly designed game mechanic should be curtailed.

I think your example is as close to a lore example as is possible, but even then it's still not quite parallel. It wasn't mech on dropship fighting that eliminated the incoming forces from the battle, meaning in this case it would be the aerotech units that are dropping airstrikes on us who kill the incoming forces, not other players. If we had a way to get multi vehicle combat in this game to the extent of being effectively a true MMO, I would be SO ON BOARD with that.

And yes, I will stand by what I said, any game that has spawn camping isn't finished being developed.

[Jaroth Corbett]

MWO does not have omni fighters to deploy. The point is the Wolves took out the dropship with their fighters, robbing the Jade Falcons of the whole Trinary being carried to the battlefield. They got rid of enemy reinforcements before they could be deployed, which is what spawn killing is.

Quote

In their control room, Radick and Ward watched the incredible success of their aerofighters against the Jade Falcon DropShip.

"Seyla," Radick whispered as he watched the DropShip hurtle toward the planet Glory. Ward wondered why Radick thought the ritual word applied here. Just what was the man responding to? Perhaps it was simply awe at the sheer success of his strategy. Radick was egotistical enough to interpret the event that way.

Radick glanced up at Ward. "That should put Kael Pershaw at a severe disadvantage. One lost DropShip containing a full Trinary of the forces he bid. We have a marvelous advantage with just one brilliant maneuver, quiaff?"

Ward hated agreeing with the man, but what he said was true. It had been a masterstroke, as he had originally termed it.

Radick chuckled with pleasure as the monitor screen registered the faraway fire and smoke of the Drop-Ship's crash on Glory.

"A marvelous advantage," he shouted gleefully.

Edited by Jaroth Corbett, 08 August 2017 - 07:33 AM.

[Marquis De Lafayette]

Carl Vickers, on 07 August 2017 - 09:19 PM, said:

The only way I can see it being abused is people peeking and poking from their DZ, simple timer should fix that.

Other than that, the only real way you could potentially fix it is to only drop waves of 12, big disadvantage for defenders and QP modes imho.

The idea of reduced rewards for dz killing could work...but only if the dropping team got zero rewards for damage,kills, etc. They did from their own dz. Otherwise it's going to get abused as one side doesn't really want to kill folks in the dz and the other side will take advantage of that.

In domination and conquest it would be an insta-loss to have to wait till all 12 of your team are dead to re-drop. Would also be devastating to Siege defenders who start out wave 1 losing a mech or 2....as the ability to quickly bring reinforcements to bare often turns the tide towards defenders wave 1.

This isn't to mention the salt inducing strategies we players could come with. Such as "leave the LRM stalker in the back alive and unmolested" on domination, conquest, incursion, even Siege and assault. An 11-man team could be totally held hostage by the single pug on their side, who won't push into the circle, is too slow to cap...and stupid (or just selfish) enough to not realize he is being left alone on purpose. So, that one team could build a commanding lead on conquest...run the clock down on domination, wreck the base on incursion and siege....heck even base cap on assault. You could even do it strategically to burn time and preserve a kill lead on skirmish. Would cause a tide wave of salt to wait on re-drops, as we the players would get creative on how "break" that feature.

Edit: also and worst....if you have a disconnect you couldn't redrop.

Edited by Marquis De Lafayette, 08 August 2017 - 07:36 AM.

[Tesunie]

Leggin Ho, on 07 August 2017 - 10:05 PM, said:

He asked for a lore based reason for spawn camping, so I'd like a lore based example of a respawn in lore, I know there's not one but hey let's see.

I'm also a Paratrooper and I'm sure when I jump into combat the guys on the ground will wait till I hit the ground and get out of my chute before they shoot at me too right??

Then tell me a lore based reason why we don't pass out from heat when our mechs are running the red line?
Why don't we get knocked around more as we get hit?
Why don't our mechs ever fall over, especially when missing a leg?
Why aren't clan mech super powerful, like they are in lore? Why do they drop in lances instead of stars?
Why do we keep being able to play, instead of having our character die the instant we die from a head shot (pilot death)? Why is our account not just deleted when such an event happens?

Why? Easy. It's a game. A game that is a player vs player game. It's a game that is designed to be fun and enjoyable to "all*" players. It's designed to be balanced so no one aspect/player/mech/weapon is suppose to be "the clearly better choice". Because it is not real, and shouldn't be based strictly on realistic properties. Basically, this game is not the same as real life. Where as in real life someone who use artillery to get some long range indiscriminate kills, in this game that ends up not being such a good thing. Recall the Long Tom aspect? Very easy to abuse with coordination and a lore based equipment. However, was very disturbing to the game's balance and play-feel.


Mycroft is right, there are many lore possible options open that could still be added into the game, and none of them would necessarily be disturbing to the game as a whole. As the game is based on BT, we have plenty of things we can look at for inspiration. Union class Dropships are one such concpet, as well as the popular concept of mechhangers as well for the defending force.


*All in indicative of "as many as possible" and at least an attempt to have the game have the potential of being fun and enjoyable to many players. Right on down to using what you enjoy yourself, so someone like myself (for example) can load up on my Medium mechs and not be at a disadvantage.



I'll reference to another game on the "lore based reason for respawn". Battlefront (any of them, but I only played 1 and 2). In that game, each army had a number of "reserves". The respawn wasn't "you specifically coming back again from the dead", but was more of "another trooper has come in from reserves to continue the fight". The BT version of the respawn would be very much the same thing, right on down to the dropship "depositing" the new mechs and mechwarriors onto the field of combat, not the same actual and literal pilot back in.

Mycroft000, on 07 August 2017 - 10:33 PM, said:

This is the most reasonable idea I've seen so far that at least puts the player in control of their mech before they instantly die. It would also have the side effect of completely eliminating the issue of having your legs damaged by your own drop ship.



Dropping in full company waves really would only work if we also had capture-able drop zones that must be occupied in order to be held. It would allow the 12 dropping together to have a reasonable advantage at their drop zone, but not an overwhelming advantage since they would already be on the losing side.

I didn't think of that... It would have a double bonus then. (That bug still in the game? I use to get hit with it, but last time I played FP, I didn't see it happen at all....)


My only concern with dropping in as full companies (12 mechs) is the wait time to get all the mechs to do so. It would let one team be able to move even more before the other side respawns, which leaves O-gens and Omega open to attack, bases open to capture/destruction, Conquest points able to be taken... or the enemy able to surround the spawn waiting for those 12 people to respawn. Although it probably would also give the best chance to break a spawn camp, it also may cause more cases of it's occurrence...?

Jaroth Corbett, on 08 August 2017 - 06:48 AM, said:

OK the point is you asked for an example from the lore & I have given it. You can keep saying that ALL the games that have spawn camping in them have poor design but like I said, ALL those games are poorly designed? Really?.......................................OK

There are some games where spawn camping is easier to do, particularly first person shooters (or any shooter really). I recall playing a game called "Dust", and some of the "elite" players memorized where the spawns where and had sniper rifles that could kill in a single hit (unlike the starter sniper rifle, which took three shots to drop someone). Let me just say, fun game, but it was not fun to die, spawn, die spawn, die, spawn, die, spawn... and I couldn't even move to do anything because they could just reload while I was dead and then kill me the moment I respawned. I just placed my controller on a table and watched after a time. Was about that enjoyable. THANKFULLY, MW:O doesn't have that bad of a time.

For the record, that wasn't a common thing in the game (Dust), but when someone(s) did it (normally a premade group of people who covered each spawn), it wasn't fun. The game made it difficult to do repeatedly (you could select your spawns) and some maps/missions had alternative ways around it, but that didn't stop people/teams from doing it.


I think the poorly designed part should be related to "how easy is it to do" more than if it can be done. Most games it is very possible to camp the spawn points, just designed not to be very easy from either respawn point selection or from semi-random spawn locations. In MW:O, it's often very easy to know where your opponent's are going to respawn, and it can be easy to do it depending upon the opponents. Poor design? I don't really agree with that. Could it be improved? Sure. Most things aren't perfect...

[Mycroft000]

Jaroth, I do understand the point you're going for, the point I'm trying to make is that if you want to eliminate the future drops, do it in such a way that the player isn't left helpless getting shot at directly while unable to react. Having a drop ship health bar that indicates the enemy is shooting the drop ship itself will functionally have exactly the same effect, however the perceived effect takes the direct "pain" of the loss away from the player and is a better way to handle that form of spawn camping, "I didn't get killed before I could do anything, they shot my drop ship down," functionally the same, by from a player psychology view, different and more acceptable.

To the question of dropping subsequent waves in full 12 man groups, I think it's a great idea in theory, but there are too many nuances that make it a less than viable solution.

Tesunie, yes, dropships damaging legs still happens, I've had more than one occasion in the last 3 weeks where I took as much as 5% damage before I was even actually inside the map(and we are talking about PGI here, if a bug in the game isn't specifically addressed in patch notes, I'm not ready to assume that they know it's happening).

As to spawn camping being poor design, I'm not simply referring to the mechanic of it alone. All aspects that lead to spawn camping contribute to the poor design:

How easy is it to camp spawn points?
How unbalancing to the outcome of the match is spawn camping?
How rewarding is it to spawn camp?
How much does the camped player get to participate in the game when being camped?

As each of those questions get addressed in the design of the game, it makes spawn camping less and less viable.

And the most important aspect is one Tesunie mentioned, games are supposed to be enjoyable for all involved. I have no issue whatsoever with anyone who is a skilled player having a slightly more difficult time winning if it means the overall fun had by the players is increased. Your(self professed spawn campers) slight loss of enjoyment over being able to aggressively push to the enemy drop zones and win because of the abuse of a game mechanic is outweighed by the increase of enjoyment had by a larger portion of the player base.

[Jaroth Corbett]

Mycroft000, on 08 August 2017 - 08:22 AM, said:

Jaroth, I do understand the point you're going for, the point I'm trying to make is that if you want to eliminate the future drops, do it in such a way that the player isn't left helpless getting shot at directly while unable to react. Having a drop ship health bar that indicates the enemy is shooting the drop ship itself will functionally have exactly the same effect, however the perceived effect takes the direct "pain" of the loss away from the player and is a better way to handle that form of spawn camping, "I didn't get killed before I could do anything, they shot my drop ship down," functionally the same, by from a player psychology view, different and more acceptable.

You no longer have a point. All you are doing is whining now. You can look at countless war documentaries or even movies based on true events & see the following scenario: A bunch of helicopters are moving to a staging area. The enemy on the ground doesn't say, "Oh look, it's the enemy. Let's chill here & let him deploy his forces on the ground in peace."

No. They get the RPGs ready to blast them out of the sky. What does that do I wonder? Oh that's right. GETTING RID OF REINFORCEMENTS BEFORE THEY CAN BE DEPLOYED.

it's called war.

I DID suggest an option for marking the LZ as being hot but it will NEVER stop people from taking out new troops before they can be used to turn the tide of a battle.

Edited by Jaroth Corbett, 08 August 2017 - 09:04 AM.

[Tesunie]

Jaroth Corbett, on 08 August 2017 - 09:03 AM, said:

You no longer have a point. All you are doing is whining now. You can look at countless war documentaries or even movies based on true events & see the following scenario: A bunch of helicopters are moving to a staging area. The enemy on the ground doesn't say, "Oh look, it's the enemy. Let's chill here & let him deploy his forces on the ground in peace."

No. They get the RPGs ready to blast them out of the sky. What does that do I wonder? Oh that's right. GETTING RID OF REINFORCEMENTS BEFORE THEY CAN BE DEPLOYED.

it's called war.

I DID suggest an option for marking the LZ as being hot but it will NEVER stop people from taking out new troops before they can be used to turn the tide of a battle.

This is a game, not actual literal war. A games intention and purpose is to be fun to play.

The objective within the game is to win, but the goal is always to have fun.

A war's objective is to survive, conquer, win. It's goal is protection and expansion.

As a game, we seek things like "balance". If one side can shoot off a nuke and the other can't, than the game is unbalanced. In a war, if one side has a nuke and the other side doesn't, it's an advantage.

Very large difference between real life war and video game war. So please, stop posting comparisons of "if this was war", as it's relevance to "this is a game" is not applicable.

Ex: In a fight, if one person has a knife and another a gun, you don't put away the gun and grab a knife. In a game, such as soccer, one goal isn't larger than the other, they are each the same to give each team as equal of a chance as possible to win. This is called balance.

[Marquis De Lafayette]

Mycroft000, on 08 August 2017 - 08:22 AM, said:

Jaroth, I do understand the point you're going for, the point I'm trying to make is that if you want to eliminate the future drops, do it in such a way that the player isn't left helpless getting shot at directly while unable to react. Having a drop ship health bar that indicates the enemy is shooting the drop ship itself will functionally have exactly the same effect, however the perceived effect takes the direct "pain" of the loss away from the player and is a better way to handle that form of spawn camping, "I didn't get killed before I could do anything, they shot my drop ship down," functionally the same, by from a player psychology view, different and more acceptable.

To the question of dropping subsequent waves in full 12 man groups, I think it's a great idea in theory, but there are too many nuances that make it a less than viable solution.

Tesunie, yes, dropships damaging legs still happens, I've had more than one occasion in the last 3 weeks where I took as much as 5% damage before I was even actually inside the map(and we are talking about PGI here, if a bug in the game isn't specifically addressed in patch notes, I'm not ready to assume that they know it's happening).

As to spawn camping being poor design, I'm not simply referring to the mechanic of it alone. All aspects that lead to spawn camping contribute to the poor design:

How easy is it to camp spawn points?
How unbalancing to the outcome of the match is spawn camping?
How rewarding is it to spawn camp?
How much does the camped player get to participate in the game when being camped?

As each of those questions get addressed in the design of the game, it makes spawn camping less and less viable.

1. To truly camp it....I.e.. Be waiting and shoot them before they hit the ground. Not easy and Very risky before the end of wave 4. First of all you have to be facing a much worse team to do it during the middle waves....second, PGI has buffed the dropships weapons and they hurt big time and kill often. What most teams do now is hug the walls and only go in after the dropship has left. Lights and mediums in the dz often run out the other side and heavies and assaults get a chance to fight. They are often overwhelmed by 3 on 1's, but it's a fight at least. It's in wave 4 where you generally see mechs getting shot as they hit the ground, but when that happens the match is already over and there are maybe less than 4 enemy mechs left.

2. If you can spawn camp the match's outcome is decided...you were better than they were and slaughtered enough of them to be able to pull it off. The balance of the match was bad...spawn killing or not

3. It's the same damage and same kill and same c-bills as killing them near the gates. What it prevents is wasting our time by chasing and trying to find a stealth armored PB who is the last guy on his side and thinks it's fun to tie us up for 10 mins extra in match, by finding a corner to hide in.

4. By definition: The guy who gets spawn camped with his last mech had more time in his first 3 mechs than most or all of his teammates did in 4 mechs. So, his participation was actually greater in terms of fighting time than his teammates. Now, if a single spawn gets overrun on some maps you can perma-kill a guy early. Yes, it's not so fun for him...but it is a strategy (often a costly one in terms of mechs) to fight 12 v 11 the rest of the match. However, if the other team pulls it off...it generally indicates a disparity between the teams and the match is all but decided anyway.

[Jaroth Corbett]

Tesunie, on 08 August 2017 - 09:26 AM, said:

This is a game, not actual literal war. A games intention and purpose is to be fun to play.

The objective within the game is to win, but the goal is always to have fun.

A war's objective is to survive, conquer, win. It's goal is protection and expansion.

As a game, we seek things like "balance". If one side can shoot off a nuke and the other can't, than the game is unbalanced. In a war, if one side has a nuke and the other side doesn't, it's an advantage.

Very large difference between real life war and video game war. So please, stop posting comparisons of "if this was war", as it's relevance to "this is a game" is not applicable.

Ex: In a fight, if one person has a knife and another a gun, you don't put away the gun and grab a knife. In a game, such as soccer, one goal isn't larger than the other, they are each the same to give each team as equal of a chance as possible to win. This is called balance.

It's called mechWARrior related to BATTLEtech. It is based on WAR. This is what happens in war. This is a game about WAR. I can't believe you actually posted that.

[Grus]

Pat Kell, on 06 July 2017 - 11:08 PM, said:

Ok, going to warn you all that this is going to be a long post so feel free to ignore it if you like but I had part of a private conversation I had with Mycroft posted here and it seems best that I further explain myself so that the small section he posted isn't misunderstood.

First off, I appreciate Mycroft taking the time to message me personally as I enjoy philosophical discussions such as we had. Anyone should feel free to do so at any time and I will answer as best I can when I have time. This discussion centered around spawn camping and his initial question was how often do we do it. I responded with a simple "As often as we can." and then went on to explain why we do it which the blurb he posted was some of that response. Why we do it is 2 fold. One, we like to win and we like to be aggressive. Very rarely do I or any other officer actually make the call to go spawn camp. What happens (and sadly this happens mostly to pugs who are struggling to find a person to follow) is that the enemy will often times not stray very far from their drop zone so when the initial fight is through, if we have any one of the original 12 mechs standing, I will generally say something like "Ok, go burn your mechs, get fresh ones and re-group in X# grid." This tells everyone still alive to go find an enemy, wherever they are, and do as much damage to their next mechs as you can before you die and all the ones who dies in the initial engagement will wait in the designated grid. At this point, the enemy is often times not yet regrouped as our pushes are often quick and brutal, win or lose. Because of this, and because the enemy didn't push out far enough on the first engagement, we will almost always find ourselves in their drop zones, trying to find mechs to shoot and to burn our 1st wave mechs. That's the aggressive part. The part where we like to win comes in to play here too though. By damaging or killing some or all of their 2nd wave mechs, we have opened up a lead that is almost impossible to come back from. We take tactical advantage of the situation on the battlefield and it's why we win as often as we do. I have been in numerous matches where we were down 6-12 or worse after the first wave and instead of following this procedure, the enemy would either fall back and regroup with their 2nd wave mechs (big mistake) or they would send in their damaged mechs in order to get fresh ones, but would regroup too close to the fight (absolutely horrible mistake). It is very simple for 12 fresh mechs to take out 6 damaged mechs and not much harder for 12 freshish mechs to take out the remaining 6 who thought it was a good idea to regroup within a grid of where the fight was taking place. The fight is now 18-12 and while we have damaged mechs, they have some on their 3 mech and by the time we die and regroup for the 3rd wave, it's now 24ish to 24ish. They have lost but still hold out hope. They have 12 mechs in varying states of damage and we have 12 fresh ones. Often times, we won't even have to dip into our 4th wave mechs at this point and those that do either don't get back to the fight in time or are just scraping for assists.

My response to Mycroft centered mainly around whether or not we (KCom or other 12 man teams) should be more gentle with pugs. You all saw some of my response but I would like to add that I do not think it is my responsibility or anyone else's to provide a safe environment for others to test the waters in CW. This is a game and everyone here has come here to try to have fun and win. Now, some can have fun while losing if they do well, or they work together with the team well or whatever but I do not have fun losing ever. This doesn't mean I won't be gracious to the enemy and salute them for winning the match but I do not have fun losing. What I will do though is try very hard to learn from it. The scenario I listed above came from a lot of matches where we fell prey to the very same issue and we learned that if we wanted to win, we had to meet the enemy with 4 distinct waves of 12 mechs. No exceptions. Not doing this is the easiest way to lose a match.

So when Mycroft suggests that we hold off on people (pugs), what he is actually (inadvertently I hope) is asking us to put ourselves in a position to lose and I am simply not willing to do that. I am actually surprised that anyone would think that it's ok to ask this of anyone. I am responsible for the well being and general happiness of KCom members and that is it. I am not responsible for anyone else and trying to shame or guilt me into shirking that responsibility is just not something I am going to entertain, ever. You don't have to agree with me, that is fine, it also doesn't matter. I will be as clear with everyone here as I was with Mycroft. I intend to win every single match I play every single time, and I will use all the experience and knowledge I have of the game to achieve that goal as often as I can. That includes spawn camping if it's required. No one else needs to follow this belief if they don't like but lets be clear, if PGI came up with some way to eliminate spawn camping (which I honestly could care less if they do or not) KCom and many other teams will simply develop new strategies and tactics to attempt to continue winning. We will do it within the CoC and I have made it very clear to every member in KCom that we will achieve this goal as often as we can WITHOUT the use of any type of game hacks period.

The issue here isn't that spawn camping exists, it's that too many people absolutely refuse to learn how to prevent it or make it better for themselves. Instead of putting in the work to join a team and develop viable strategies, they seek to look to outside sources to fix the troubles they are having. This is not going to help them in the long run. If PGI "fixes" spawn camping, it will simply be replaced with some other winning strategy by the teams that work hard enough to develop it or learn from watch others do it. At some point, people need to take on the responsibility for themselves of fixing the issues they are having because if you rely on others to provide your happiness for you, you will be unhappy most of your life.

I understand that some will get into CW and will not enjoy themselves and end up not playing any more. That is unfortunate, I just want people to understand that asking us to back off the throttle some isn't going to fix the problem. It's just not. two things will happen, we will lose more and many of our players will stop playing because they want to win and they want to be aggressive. They would not tolerate this order from me and would either ignore it or quit playing. Second, another unit would simply (and many do) do the same as we do and stomp uncoordinated pugs.

Calling out KCom or any other well coordinated team for being too aggressive is looking at the result of the problem rather than the cause. CW is supposed to be a team environment where teams can get together and fight each other. Pugs are meant to fill in groups as necessary but for numerous reasons, there simply aren't that many teams playing any more. This results in Pugs filling entire teams facing some of the few remaining hardcore teams left who have been here from the beginning. Please remember that everything we do, we do because of the lessons we have learned playing CW almost exclusively from the very beginning. This was a time when there were many more active teams around and some very good players. We had to develop strategies that would allow us to beat them and now that they are in place, we have them so engrained in our playstyle that I don't think we could turn it off even if we wanted too.

Not to mention, I honest think that I am being disrespectful to people when I do not try the best I can. It is disrespectful to my opponents because it deprives them of the opportunity to learn something new or something they may not be aware of and it is disrespectful to my teammates who are counting on me to help them to victory. I will not do either of these things. I have no problem with Mycroft or anyone else trying to be kind to new players and providing them with a "safe environment" for them to learn in if they think that will help, I just disagree with the belief that it will help. Therefore, I will not do it.

Several times I have mentioned trying to learn from difficult situations and I have been hit with comments like "what can you learn from get stomped 48-6 and you're last 3 mechs were shot in the dropship" or "people don't learn in stressful situations". I believe these comments to be a huge fallacy on how and when people learn. Stressful situations are exactly when people are most likely to learn. It's an evolutionary tactic we have developed to try to prevent ourselves from being put back in those stressful situations. Some chose to avoid it altogether but others will come up with amazing new ideas to try to deal with the situation better. These are the people who inevitably rise to the top whenever they apply this strategy. It happens in all things in life. They work hard, they practice and train, they watch how others who are better then they are handle the situation. They do all sorts of things to try to improve themselves so that when they find them selves in that situation again, they don't panic but rather rise to it.

As to what can be learned from it. Tons. Get on a team. if you are unwilling or unable to get on a team, use voip to try to wrangle your team into some sort of strategy, doesn't really matter what it is, just get them all agreeing to do something together...anything as long as it's together is almost always better then 3 over here, 4 in the middle and several loners wandering off doing whatever it is that they do on their jolly little Rambo jaunts. Sitting back in your base, is not a viable strategy, ever. It's an invitation to be shot in your drop ship. You should learn to never run off by yourself. You should learn to never reinforce and always regroup well away from the main fight. You should learn to push out and have the first engagement be as far away from your drop zones as possible to allow for an unopposed regrouping. You should learn to bring builds suitable for the map and suitable for the strategy you want to use. Asking what can be learned from a 48-6 stomp is basically admitting that you don't want to put in any effort into learning more about the game. You should, most importantly, learn that you need to improve both as an individual player and as a team player. How you do that is up to you but choosing to ignore it will lead to additional 48-6 stomps and eventually you will quit the game. None of this is hard to do, but it does take effort and a desire to do better. If you chose to ignore all of this advice, that is absolutely within your right to do but you can't seriously expect me or anyone else to tone it down for people who think this way. It's just simply not going to happen. Not because we are mean or nasty or unfair or anything else, it's because we like to win just as much as that other guy does, we just put in more effort and played a smarter match. In fact, in my opinion, asking us to sacrifice or risk sacrificing our own personal happiness and enjoyment of this game by toning things down and risk losing is the mean and nasty thing. My happiness is not the property of the "common good", to be sacrificed at someone else's whim in an effort to provided someone else with it. If they want happiness, it is their responsibility to achieve it and not mine to provide it for them (unless I chose to).

I am thinking they need to change the warning for CW to something simpler to understand and much more to the point. It should simply say "There be Dragons."

well put Patrica very eloquent.

[Grus]

I still say they need to change the dropships to overlords... the high vantage points and longer range firepower would be a better deterant than the current dropships. Have the doors be able to block incoming fire instead of being a animation. Having them land and stay there for a few moments and the mech auto walk (to a point) off the ramp would counter just saying in the egg. You would have the ability to fire your weapons and twist your torso.

[RustyBolts]

Spawn camping sucks if you are the spawnee. However, you have to prevent the spawnees, from becoming campers in their spawn point. Current mode working as intended.

[Jaroth Corbett]

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Why we do it is 2 fold. One, we like to win and we like to be aggressive.

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I do not think it is my responsibility or anyone else's to provide a safe environment for others to test the waters in CW

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Now, some can have fun while losing if they do well, or they work together with the team well or whatever but I do not have fun losing ever. This doesn't mean I won't be gracious to the enemy and salute them for winning the match but I do not have fun losing. What I will do though is try very hard to learn from it. The scenario I listed above came from a lot of matches where we fell prey to the very same issue and we learned that if we wanted to win, we had to meet the enemy with 4 distinct waves of 12 mechs. No exceptions. Not doing this is the easiest way to lose a match.

Pat Kell, all i can say in response to that & everything else in that post is:

[James Argent]

In my opinion, most of the problem with being spawncamped is the zero skill it takes to shoot and kill a dropping mech that can't even shoot back. It adds insult to injury. The campees, for whatever reason it happened, already know they lost. Not letting them even get any shots off is like spitting on a guy you just knocked out. Sure, it takes a skill disparity to get the camping team to that point, but if they're that much better why can't the game allow the other team a fighting chance to do something...anything...with their mechs when the victory is already assured?

Drop pods, even in the camped drop zone, would solve the 'shot while unable to shoot back' thing. Only once the drop is complete and the mech is fully operational and able to fire, have the pod crack open only from the direction the mech is facing and remain in place so that the dropped mech can't be insta-killed from behind. Pods could be either invulnerable and disappear after a set time or ablative and last as long as their armor points will carry them.

Or they can simply open the Leopard's side doors and let dropping mechs fire on the campers during the approach before being dropped. Maybe even allow players to step out the side doors early for 'dropshp bug' style leg damage (or less, if jump jets are used to cushion the fall). Anything to prevent the fish-in-a-barrel situation we have now.

[Pat Kell]

Mycroft000, on 07 August 2017 - 07:14 PM, said:

Pat, the scenario I am referring to was something that happened on Boreal Vault(a very long time ago not sure exactly when), we opened the gates, and were met by KCom forces who focused fire well enough that to our 12 deaths, your guys lost 2-3, I can't remember for sure. I know it wasn't so fast that all 12 of us dropped in the same drop ships, but quick enough that your guys made it to the drop zone to start shooting people as they dropped. With more information, how should we have responded?

In that scenario where there is no coming back from the defender's outward aggressive push(valid tactic), why should the team that has 100% lost the match be forced to sit through you killing them as they fall instead of you reaching their spawn where they are landing as a full 12 man 2nd wave with a Union Class drop ship, a drop ship that has armor and structure that you can destroy, and if you do destroy it, it shuts down their 3rd and 4th waves, and you win? It presents you with an opportunity to win the match decisively without forcing the losing team to sit through the un-fun process of being farmed with no opportunity of any kind to mount even the inkling of a comeback. If the spawn camping is going to happen, make it a built in mechanic of the game that ends the match, not a situation where people who are trying to enjoy a game they want to participate in end up in a position where there is literally nothing to be done but sit and wait. I don't think it's fair for the timid teams to hide in their drop zone without you having a way to end the match, just like I don't think it's fair for the incredibly aggressive teams to force the losers to wait helplessly while you end the match in an way that is both excruciatingly slow and fast at the same time.

I still am not sure most of the proponents of spawn camping realize just how bad of a game design mechanic the current spawn system is. I have seen 50 50's suggestion to do away with spawns and make it a campaign where you have successive matches in a 12v12 setting. I think that's as good of a solution as the numerous ideas that have been presented in this thread, all of which are either ignored, or shot down because everyone seems to claim that it wouldn't change anything at all and spawn campers would just find a better way to do it.

Your comments on padding stats have literally zero to do with any discussion I am pursuing here. I'm talking about game design. I'm not talking about the deeper tactics and game play strategies that more advanced players should always keep at the forefront of their minds. That's a discussion for elsewhere.

Poorly designed respawn mechanics are not the responsibility of the losing players in a match, those players end up being soured on a game mode that they may have found more interest in if they lost the match in a way that actually makes sense from a gameplay perspective. Bad game design leads to people not continuing to play the game and I know your viewpoint on that, I think you are wrong. If I hadn't found a group to play with, and been so interested in the lore this game is based on I wouldn't be here now. I wouldn't have had the newly formed unit that I'm in be in 66th place on the loyalist leaderboards with only 4-8 of us being in faction play regularly(which all progress has pretty much come to a complete halt while people are focused on the Civil War leaderboard event).

I don't think anyone in this discussion can even come close to saying that FP is a fully fleshed out solid game mode, even PGI didn't consider it out of Beta until a little over a year ago, and their concept of the completed product was such a massive flop that they almost completely retooled FP 7 months later.

So I ask again, with all of that taken into account, why should new players suffer through matches that are not fun for you, or for them? Pat, I know I'm not going to convince you.

That tactic we used is something we commonly do in order to try to prevent base rushers. We have found that by being aggressive and pushing out as soon as the gate is open, even if the push bombs, we have enough time to get back to the gens and defend them. This is the polar opposite of what I see almost every single match I play when I am attacking. People sitting back by the gens, thinking they have a good spot to defend from and sometimes they are right, we lose all 12 mechs and have to make another run of it. The amount of times we have wiped all 12 mechs with only losing a few of ours is astonishing but no quite so astonishing as the fact that over and over and over again I have told people that they need to be fighting in front of the gens, as close to the gate as they can or they risk getting rushed. Yet it still happens, almost every single match I am in.

The same is true on fighting in front of your spawns and preferably as far in front as you can. If you don't want to get spawn camped, get your but up there and help your team out. The sad fact is that because a lot of people won't do this, the brave/smart ones will rush out to where they should be, find themselves understrength, die and just as they are spawning in, we are finishing off the armor farmers in the back. These good players are made to suffer because of the poor choices the armor farmers are making. That is the issue with the game. Preventing spawn camping is easy, even as a pug. The issue is not the game mode, it's the choices being made while playing that game mode. I am telling people all the time how to avoid getting spawn camped and so are others yet people keep letting it happen.

The match you listed as an example is a perfect example. The attacker is closer to the gate than the defender is and should have no problem opening and beginning to enter the gate before the defending team can really mount any sizable force up to repel them effectively and still be able to be close enough to the gate to qqqqqqqqqqqqspawn camp. The only reason we are able to do this is because people do not get the gate open very fast. If you allow us to get up to the gate, get set up and prepare for pushing out before you open the gate, who is really at fault here? You could of opened the gate sooner and pushed in as a unit or a group but instead, people half stepped it, traded shots with us etc etc a million excuses why it didn't get open in time. We got set up, you opened the gate and we came and got you. Yea, we could of went back in the gate but we have found that trying to defend the gens with damaged mechs tend to lead to gen rushes, where all your wounded mechs die rather quickly and it takes too long to get back and effectively protect the gens. So no, we go out with our damaged mechs, do as much damage as we can as far in front of our gens as we can so that we don't get gen rushed.

Why should people be forced to sit through matches that are no fun for the winners and no fun for the losers? First off, I always have fun when I win...it varies to some degree based on how close the match is but winning is always fun. Second, if I agree to play a match where 4 respawns are present, I am going to hold up my end of the bargain and finish the match even if I am getting spawn camped and I am going to try to find something to learn from it (which is also fun for me). I am not saying that I object to all of the ideas I see here, I just don't think they are going to fix what you are really upset about. There will always be players out there that are better than us and how we deal with those situations determine how much we are able to improve ourselves. Looking for outside sources to fix the problem will often times lead to half measures and immense frustration. Finding ways to fix it yourself will lead to self improvement and enjoyment. That's why people should be forced to sit through those matches. It provides them with opportunities to either enjoy themselves by winning or opportunities to learn something from a loss. Whether or not they choose to take advantage of those opportunities is up to them and certainly is not something myself or anyone else should be responsible for.

Also, my comments on padding stats has a lot to do with this. It puts people in the mindset that by doing better somehow as an individual in a team play mode means something important, it does not. All it means it that you end up losing and getting spawn camped often. I am trying to show people how they can be more successful at this game mode with out waiting for the pie in the sky dream of having PGI miraculously fix this. This is exactly what I mean by looking to outside sources. There are a lot of people in here proposing ideas on how to fix this mode that will either never be implemented by PGI or are far off into the future. Stop looking for them to fix your problems and start looking within yourself. The ability is there, it just seems that a lot of people have been trained to expect other people to fix their own problems rather than taking the hard yet more satisfying and rewarding path of fixing it for themselves.

Maybe a better question to ask is why should a team that has been searching for a match for 10+ minutes be forced to allow the enemy to surrender? Why does losing a match suddenly give anyone the right to deny the victor some enjoyment?

Edited by Pat Kell, 08 August 2017 - 04:53 PM.