Been a bunch of ideas thrown around over the years but nothing done.
Well, not entirely true, the maps were changed in some instances, drop zones moved, walls put in.
But that wasn't to stop spawn camping, only make it a little harder... though some might argue that the walls actually made it easier.
So there have been plenty of discussions on:
- Changing the dropship loadouts
- Longtomming the landing site before sending in the drop ship
- Putting turrets in
- Forcefields
- etc
Most of them aimed at making the dropzones a safe zone.
The counter argument to that is players then refuse to leave their drop zones which tends to compound the problem as the enemy comes looking for you and it actually has the opposite effect of encouraging spawn camping.
Ironically, as soon as the other team decides to ignore the drop zones and go straight for the objectives we see threads complaining about people 'base rushing' or zerg tactics and not stopping to fight so you might understand the frustration that occurs because it seems we are damned if we do, damned if we don't.
(We being the player base overall)
Conquest mode is about the only mode that works successfully because it has multiple objectives and a win condition that means something.
There was some discussion prior to Solaris about reviewing the objectives in the various modes but who knows what that might mean and we haven't heard anything since but discussion on the modes themselves is not what you are talking about here.
Personally, I think there is one of two solutions:
OPTION 1
Make the dropzones an objective
We have a variety of capture mechanics in the game, the suggestion here is to turn the drop zones into an area that can be captured.
This has multiple effects.
- Should a team be successful in pushing (let's go with that description) their opponent back to their drop zone, then they can be successfully rewarded by capturing the dropzone and preventing that lance from being reinforced.
ie. The dropship stops turning up there.
- 2. The lance who has their dropzone contested needs to get the area cleared of enemy mechs before they can receive reinforcements meaning they are not thrown to the lions with a new mech because the dropship pilot is too dumb to know when it's a bad idea. A small side effect of this is encouraging team mates to help free a dropzone that is under siege for which there could also be a reward.
ie. Fight to protect the zone or lose it.
To combine with this we need to be able to select drop zones. It's possible at the moment but really clunky and merely shifts another player into the contested drop zone. There was some discussion on getting this feature added properly to the game but there was some problem with redirecting the dropships to the alternate locations, flight paths and collisions or some such.(Why can't some locations have lifts?)
I would also suggest that the placement of the dropzones would need to be looked at so they are not right next door to each other. It would also be nice to see the dropships equipped with their default loadout from the TRO as well.
More than that, it opens up the possibility for a rolling battle where we can try and control the map, seize new locations to mount our attacks from and really make the whole thing a bit more dynamic.
OPTION 2
Change the way we use the drop decks and remove the multiple drops into a single match.
We only have spawn camping because we can respawn.
Face it.
It's not a problem in Quick Play.
So the alternative might be to use the drop decks differently and have them span over multiple matches as a resource we have to manage and prepare a bit differently.
This immediately resolves the spawn camping issue but requires a big rethink/redesign of Faction Play.
Not necessarily a bad thing but it would really change the way the games play and would mean that the individual matches essentially play out the same as they do in Quick Play.
So, that's bad from the perspective of having longer games and where it can be fun to have repeated drops into the same battle.
On the plus side:
- It would make the transition from Quick Play to Faction Play more streamlined making it a little easier for new players.
- It also means that any map or mode that we might get added to the game can go straight into QP and FP which streamlines development work.
- This approach could also mean that we combine the QP Group Queue with FP Invasion as well as incorporate Scouting and bring three queues into one consolidating the player base and therefore improve wait times.
- With a complete revamp it might be able to work across the three servers.
- The 'Faction Play' part of the game is then in the pre and post match where we could get a number of different features added to add depth and immersion.
EDIT: Curse this editor.
Edited by 50 50, 19 June 2018 - 06:19 PM.