1169 replies to this topic

[justcallme A S H]

https://mwomercs.com...oming-podcasts/

Note from Paul above, FP getting attention, maybe.

Let's try to get the ideas together into one simple/succinct product by the time the thread goes up.

I'll collate and update this first post as we go, ideas etc. And yeah I will make an executive call on what to put in and what not... That call will revolve around:

• Pie-in-the-sky ideas will be skipped as they convlute.
  
• Stuff that is simply 'too hard'.
  
• KISS - Keep It Simple Stupid, the ideas needs to be quick wins.

All of this of course won't hold a purpose until AFTER the podcast/town hall about what Paul's actual vision/idea is. Given we have no idea what that is right now.

Edited by justcallme A S H, 01 August 2018 - 07:15 PM.

[Spheroid]

When is the date of the podcast? That would be useful info.

[GweNTLeR]

Delete QP modes and maps is all they need to do.
Although, It is worth reducing the cooldown on scouting effects (like just for a bit, -10%) to make it a bigger advantage.

[Spheroid]

@Gwentler: If you delete the QP modes you are left with only siege. I can't believe anyone would want that. Do you not remember phase 1 and 2? Why return to that?

You don't enjoy multiple wave conquest or skirmish? There is plenty variety and chance for comeback in such combat.

Edited by Spheroid, 01 August 2018 - 08:00 PM.

[justcallme A S H]

My Top Ideas / Quick Wins.

Most of which we've all seen before...

• Loyalist / Merc Tree - Max Rank 20 Loyalist / Rank 10 for Merc. Many users achieved this 2 years ago, there is no motivation. From a LORE/Roleplay perspective some people do not WANT to pledge allegiance to another Clan, in fact most people in FP loyalist camp won't. Tree reset needs to occur once you max it out, it is an absolute neccesity at this point.
  
• 1-Bucket Merger / Purpose of the map - There is now no 'purpose' to Faction Play. It is just IS against Clan and the Tug-o-War bar essentially means nothing. There is rarely one side that 'wins' the fight anymore as a result, which ties into the below point.
  
• Mercs Insta Contract Switch vs Loyalist- While this idea in theory was good, in practice it is poor. It just allows teams to switch side to avoid fights while still punishing loyalists excessively. This means the queue volumes jump around too much and #2 - occurs even less because of constant switching. IMO this change should be reversed for Mercs.
  
• Tug-O-War bar is BROKEN - You can win all games, get the bar to 97% full and in the last 30mins the opposing side can get 2 wins and claw the back back to under 95% and stop a planet capture. Matt Neuman knows this is an issue, thus PGI does, even a TUK win result was altered (from Clan to IS) because of this poor calculation. It needs to be resolved.
  
• Loylist Probation Games - Make it 5 and not 10. Least you can do it in an hour via scouting rather than 2-3hrs. No reason to have it 10 games.
  
• IS v IS / Clan v Clan - This really has not eventuated at all. Needs to happen, keeps things interesting.
  
• Incursion - Is often just a pointless base rush. Increase base points hitpoints by 30% so it cannot be taken out as a means of instant victory but still leaves it open to those who just want to throw 48 mechs at an objective without actually shooting the enemy mechs (which often makes games boring/frustrating).
  
• New Player Experience - We all know it isn't great. PGI has a big warning screen for new players but they don't listen. New Players should be gated from Faction Play as a result. Understand this is controversial but it is not the new place for anyone fresh to the game. Lets gate FP by making new accounts spend 50-100 games in QP first to 'qualify'. While it won't stop all the issues, it will alleviate some (basic gameplay, map awareness etc).
  
• Regular Events - We were promised regular stuff as part of FP4.1. It just isn't happening, that was December 2016.

Some larger stuff

• SEIGE Maps - Some maps are inherrantly bad like Boreal Vault and Sulferous Rift. Boreal needs some of the middle hills inside the gate reworked and so does Vitric. Make it a little less choke-point to defend, expand the trenches a little etc. Can expand on this in greater detail if required, otherwise post will get too long. I know PGI have previously acknowledged Boreal Vault as an issue, be good to see that fixed.
  
• In-game UI - Tweaks so Units can recruit players. Currently they only real way is in the depths of sub-forums here or the somewhat troublesome in-game chat. Make a 'Marketplace' of sorts where a Unit Leader can advertise. Have some basic searchable items/tags like 'Competitive / Casual' 'Loyalist / Merc' etc.
  
• Drop Zone walls - To alleviate some spawn camping sitiatuons need to move the Spawns a bit closer to gether on some maps and also have the walls face 45deg INWARD toward the drop zone centre. This will stop spawn camping a little by letting dropships shoot OVER the walls. Currently you can hit behind walls, wait for dropship to leave, go kill mechs. Adjusting the wall angle instantly resolves this big complaint. Will it stop it entirely? No, but it will help.

Edited by justcallme A S H, 01 August 2018 - 09:19 PM.

[GweNTLeR]

@Spheroid I REALLY do not enjoy alpine or polar skirmish or domination when playing FP. Because it becomes boring lurms or ERLL match. I know many people who support this opinion. And yes, plase 1 and 2 were better IMO.

[Grus]

How about some maps that aren't DOTA clones?

How about some other types of objectives? Kill the Egg, defend the HQ

[justcallme A S H]

Spheroid, on 01 August 2018 - 07:51 PM, said:

When is the date of the podcast? That would be useful info.

TBA.

GweNTLeR, on 01 August 2018 - 07:52 PM, said:

Delete QP modes and maps is all they need to do.
Although, It is worth reducing the cooldown on scouting effects (like just for a bit, -10%) to make it a bigger advantage.

Realistically that will never happen.
Scouting could use some adjustment I guess, but overall, it's impact is less than the larger issues.

[Jaybles-The-PegLeg-PotatoCaptain]

Monthly or Bi Weekly IS vs IS or Clan vs Clan events would be great, even if they run the event without rewards, This needs to return.

I know population is low, but maybe they could expand to two queues:

1. The 'one bukkit' we have now

2. A 'Conflict queue'

Idea is you have the first week of each month to pick one of two factions involved in the 'conflict'. It locks you in for the duration of the conflict( 1 week, 2 week, or maybe rest of month.). At the end of the 'conflict' you get a reward based on the number of total drops you participated in during the 'conflict' with an added bonus for being on the winning side. A visible running count of the number of players signed up for each faction would probably be necessary to balance sides.

As a far as incursion, I'm not sure it plays well with the structure of FP and think it should be removed from rotation. I don't know if there is an appropriate number of hit points/ turrets you can add to make destroying the base still an option while negating the ability of units to drop four waves of assassins or linebackers and just dunk it anyway.

[dante245]

about time

[Eisenhorne]

My top ideas

* Allow Loyalty Points to be converted to MC once you're past rank 20. Conversion rate can be tweaked, but maybe 75 to 1? So a good faction play drop at rank 20 would reward 1500 loyalty points, which can be converted to 20 MC. So experienced players have an incentive to keep playing, to get some hero mechs.

* (F) Faction variant mechs. Don't have to be a unique variant, but they should have a c-bill bonus, and a faction specific paint job. Only purchasable at Rank 20 of your aligned faction. Should be distinctive mechs for each House / Clan. Maybe Ghost Bear gets (F) Kodiaks, Davion gets (F) Victors, etc. Or maybe if you hit Rank 20, you just get to pick a mech, and you get a (F) version of it.

* Show how many groups are queued, and how many are ahead of you in line waiting for lobby / queue. Allow use of chat / friends lists while in queue.

* Incursion buildings are doubled in health, turrets shoot large lasers like Siege gate turrets instead of medium lasers.

* I liked the idea of Long Tom, but it seems a bit overpowered. If scouting gets to Tier 3 FP bonuses, the team with the bonuses should have a cooldown reduction on the global strike cooldown. "Artillery Support" just means they can use more strikes.

* Seasonal rewards for faction play. Solaris has 3 month seasons with top players rewarded, so should Faction Play. Any player with over 300 FP siege wins (or 600 FP Scouting wins) should get an MC / Cbill bonus, maybe a few mechbays. Players with better performance can get additional rewards, not sure on the criteria that should be used for that.

* Unit Mechs for Faction Play. Allow units to purchase battlemechs for their units, that are only usable by unit members, in faction play. Mechs would accrue experience like normal battlemechs, but only a unit member of a certain rank could modify / skill the mech. Units start with 4 mechbays, like a normal player, and can purchase additional mech bays for MC. Mech simply shows as "in game" if a unit member has selected it for a faction deck while in lobby and while in game.

* Have 3 conflicts at once, an IS vs IS one, a Clan vs Clan one, and an IS vs Clan one. When you queue for faction play, it enters you into both applicable ones for your faction, so imbalanced side populations won't matter. If no clanners are on, everyone just plays IS vs IS. If BCMC/Evil is rocking out Clan side, people can't just go Clan to avoid fighting them.

* Each of the 3 above conflicts should be centered on a single planet. The unit that has the most unit members who have wins on that planet during the conflict gets the planet. Each planet should have a bonus, things like "Autocannons 10% cheaper", "Light Fusion Engines 25% cheaper, etc. Just price reductions in equipment, materiel, or consumables, that benefit unit members who hold the planets. MC generation per planet the unit holds should also remain, so the units can buy mechs / mech bays.

* Each Planet should only support certain types of maps. Some planets might have all biomes, but a desert planet wouldn't have a frozen city. Make the planets feel unique.

* Add a new game mode in addition to Siege that is faction play only. I'd love a Capture the Flag type game mode, where you need to take and hold a point in the center of the map to get Intel or something (kinda like an incursion battery) and then return it to your base. First team to return 5 batteries wins maybe.

* Make it more profitable to win by objectives, or at least equally profitable. If you complete the objective early, your team should get credit for killing every enemy mech for reward purposes. So, if you killed 12 of the enemy team, then the game should calculate the total rewards possible for 36 solo kills at half the damage of the enemy mech, and divide that reward up equally amongst the other players. Just an example.

Edited by Eisenhorne, 01 August 2018 - 09:55 PM.

[S O L A I S]

My idea is simple and very doable.

More events like the holidays where you can do IS v IS and Clan v Clan. It breaks things up and is fun and balanced! Those of us who have been around miss those same tech battles which were part of the game before the potato uprising got quick play maps and things like incursion into the mix.

[vonJerg]

Interesting ideas you have there Eisenhorne, o7.

1.- Incursion out or at least double the health of the base objects.
2.- 3 conflicts at once by Eisenhorne sounds great (IS vs IS, CLAN vs CLAN, IS vs CLAN)
3.- do something about tug of war mechanic/values.
4.- Loyalist tree reset once reached lvl20, so the player has initiative to stay with that faction
5.- initiative for playing FP at first place: get 200 match score and a victory in invasion = 4 MC, get 200 match score and a tie in invasion = 3 MC, get 200 match score and lose in invasion = 2 MC, get 100 match score and a win in scouting = 1 MC.
6.- as Ash suggested, lean drop zone walls inward 45 degrees

[GweNTLeR]

Eisenhorne, on 01 August 2018 - 09:53 PM, said:

My top ideas

* Allow Loyalty Points to be converted to MC once you're past rank 20. Conversion rate can be tweaked, but maybe 75 to 1? So a good faction play drop at rank 20 would reward 1500 loyalty points, which can be converted to 20 MC. So experienced players have an incentive to keep playing, to get some hero mechs.
.

This, plus allow your faction camo pattern and faction colors(for example liao orange) to be purchased with LP past rank 20.
Also, would make sense to give some LP bonuses for using faction camo pattern. Will make FW more colorful for sure
On the second thought, a better idea for PGI could be an increasing discount for faction camo and colors, depending on what rank you are now (like 0% on the first rank, up to 85% on rank 20).

Edited by GweNTLeR, 02 August 2018 - 12:51 AM.

[Fuerchtenichts]

• Allow to buy and use additional Drop Decks (at least another 4)
  
• Allow Clan and IS Mechs to be used in one Drop Deck (no mixed clan/IS tech weapons)
  
• Implement voice chat rooms inside LFG or enable premades to place link information to their TS or discord server channel in LFG overview
  
• Define basic cbill/gsp FP participation reward independend from the outcome of the match (ruling out non-participation/afk/quit) to attract new FP players
  
• Invasion Maps: the team with the bigger premade always has to attack (possible link to FP leaderboard information trying to calculate the "better" premade)

Edited by Fuerchtenichts, 02 August 2018 - 12:01 AM.

[creativeabyss]

Salvage of some sort would be awesome, and it would differentiate fw from from qp. on top of that, its one of the staples of the BattleTech universe and is in every MechWarrior videogame iteration except for mwo

if i could choose how they implement salvage, id say they should do a unit level supply cache and the items would go into a single unit inventory, to be handed out to unit mates by the unit commander, or anyone whod be given that power in the rank management portion of the unit tab. then you have something for people to get that isn't the standerd currencies received in qp and is unique to fw. you could then have a slider like you do in BattleTech when you take a contract that could shift between receiving a higher cbill payout or a higher salvage payout. let loyalists receive at all times max salvage payout for their faction, plus like, 1 item to reward them for their loyalty, and to differentiate via rewards between the merc and loyalist paths,. mercs would have the option to choose extra cbills or salvage, and loyalists always would get more salvage then mercs. couple this with a pullback on the "instant contract flipping" and your good to go.

but honestly, as long as they do something to expand fw outside of the gameplay side, id be happy. dropdeck warfare is cool, but for faction play to live up to its name, it needs more stuff from the bt universe in it.


edit:id also love to see these 2 points from the post above mine, if my opinion matters at all.

• Implement voice chat rooms inside LFG or enable premades to place link information to their TS or discord server channel in LFG overview
  
• Define basic cbill/gsp FP participation reward independend from the outcome of the match (ruling out non-participation/afk/quit) to attract new FP players

Edited by creativeabyss, 02 August 2018 - 12:04 AM.

[NUMBERZero1032]

4x the objective health/time/points for 4x the mechs
Currently, objective goals in faction play only have moderate increases compared to their quickplay counterparts. Just multiply some quickplay values by 4 since you're using and fighting with 4x the mechs.

Domination: 4 minutes on the clock, 4x the amount of time taken away on Alpha/Beta destruction.
Incursion: 4x the health from quickplay values on base walls, mobile field bases, and base support structures (leave support structure timers alone)
Conquest: 3000 points.
Assault: 4x the base capture time from quickplay.
Skirmish: ALREADY FITS THE CRITERIA, OBVIOUSLY.
Siege: Do not touch.




Secondary ideas:
-Delet Boreal Vault
-Rotate generators away from wall on Vitric Forge

[Xavier]

Selectable drop zones: remove the walls around drop zones that were placed their to prevent farming and instead allow pilots to select which DZ they wish to land.
Win Condition Change: allow 75% victory condition instead of the 90% currently used.
Seige mode revisited: seige mode games have become very static and stagnant when compared to the dynamic strategies seen in conquest/domination/incursion modes. Seige mode needs to be rethought. (Personally conquest is my favorite FP mode right now)
More is v is and clan v clan conflicts: the is v clan only conflict has become stale. Their need to be more creative formations of the larger conflict pitting multiple clans versus other multiple clans, same for IS and even mixed IS and Clan versus other mixed IS and clan groups.
Faction play rewards should be converted to recurring rewards: rather than the one time rewards based system we have now FP rewards should be perpetual rewards that grow as you hit higher ranks. This would encourage people to continue playing after having hit rank 20. Loyalist rewards should be significantly larger than that of mercs in this scenario.
Mercs should have instant contract switching: mercs should be able to switch contracts instantly to help balance out population.
Faction play needs to be a community saga: rather than living out lore FP needs to be a saga that a creative director thinks up storylines for and which the community lives out. Let us write our own story and form our own alliances/enemies/truces/enemies based upon a custom storyline. This would give the fights meaning.

Edited by Xavier, 03 August 2018 - 05:31 PM.

[iLLcapitan]

[Redacted]
If you don't like the invasion maps, go play QP.

Max. effort proposal: Back to Phase 2 while keeping skirmish, assault & conquest with the ability to match IS vs IS and clan vs clan.

Edited by Tina Benoit, 03 August 2018 - 10:32 AM.
nonconstructive/insult

[50 50]

Well, not sure it would be enough to just look at quick fixes. Without a significant content update it's only going to dribble along.
To me that would be changing the map, and breaking it down to just a few planets that we fight back and forth over that can provide modifiers to values for the side that controls them.

However, as a first step I would suggest aiming at a way to bring back some faction identity and doing something about the match making and wait times.

Therefore I suggest that:

• Break the conflict into 8 sides

*The 5 great houses.
*Warden and Crusader Clans to allow more to be added without increasing the number of sides.
*Splinter states to cover te FRR and any new IS factions as above.

• Limit teams to only having players from a single side (not faction).

This is to bring back a sense of fighting for your side in the conflict. It's what we had before the one bucket anyway and should make sense. Mercenaries are kind of a wild card in the team composition in this sense.

• Limit groups to a maximum of 4. (not teams)

This is to allow for modular grouping and provide flexibility in the match maker when there may not be enough players to make a full 12 v 12.

• Allow modular grouping to cater for varying populations between the sides and give the match maker flexibility.

This means allowing battles to take place as 4v4 and 8v8 as well as 12v12 in more of a free for all approach.
This does not involve any splitting of queues or creating any new buckets. It simply allows flexibility to cater for different numbers of players across more sides while still allowing the larger conflicts to occur if there are enough groups queuing for multiple sides in the conflict.

• Disregard the map and use a free for all approach for the battles.

Essentially, we group up, click ready and go into the queue. No borders means any one side can fight any other and we accumulate victory points for our side when we win. 1 point per lance in the battle.


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To go further than this would be to talk about redesigning the map and simplifying it down to a handful of planetary systems.
Create simple attack lanes that represent base values for the sides which the planetary systems act as smodifiers for.
eg: Each faction has a trade lane that represents c-bill earnings. Capturing systems from other sides adds them to your attack lane, each one modifying the base value up for loyalists and down for mercenaries.
Consider having more lanes and different base values along with new features to build depth into the mode.
Personally I believe it is worth delving into further because if you don't put the idea out to be evaluated, it will never be considered.