1169 replies to this topic

[justcallme A S H]

Hey Paul - Good list man. I forgot one pretty big thing.

Population reset / dynamic numbers.

If you look at Clan Diamond Shark vs Davion as example here, the population differences are like 3% vs 12%. Meaning you earn more as a Merc going with the new factions created as the population counts legacy accounts/loyalists/Mercs from, as far as I can tell, inception.

If these numbers were dynamic rather than going back to inception that will help population balance a little. Effectively a player does not count as active until they have played 5 games of FP in say a 3 month period, if they go inactive they no longer count (up to you to work the legnth out). This would mean the population numbers will change regularly rather than be static and skewed like they are now. Should be a fairly easy coding change based on tables and data I'd imagine you already have.

[TWIAFU]

GBxGhostRyder, on 09 August 2018 - 10:59 AM, said:

None of this is going to make one bit of difference as long as its Solo players VS premade teams it will still end in a FP ghost town ether split the FP queues like you did in QP or limit premade groups to 2man or a 4 man per side per drop.

Better idea, make it so solo are automatically put into a group.

Since this IS THE Teamwork/Unit Queue, participate!!!!

[Kanajashi]

Paul Inouye, on 09 August 2018 - 10:02 AM, said:

snip

That list is an amazing starting point for the FP investigations.

Paul Inouye, on 09 August 2018 - 10:02 AM, said:

• Faction specific rewards (Colors/boltons/cockpit items/skins/etc)
  
• LP used as a currency
  
• Story/Lore/Faction driven choices to cement a desire to stay loyal
  
• Expand on the Loyalist path drastically
  
• Expand on lore in global descriptions in FP

Warframe has a good example of this with their syndicates. By wearing decals or completing missions for a specific syndicate you will earn reputation points. These can be spent to buy exclusive weapons, cosmetics, upgrades and consumables. For MWO our faction stores should have things like colors, patterns, cockpit items, mechbays and even faction specific mechs such as the clan totem mechs such as the Nova Cat.

Paul Inouye, on 09 August 2018 - 10:02 AM, said:

• Incursion base building health adjustments.

While this would be nice to help cut down on base rushing I still feel that both teams having a base was the wrong way to implement this mode. I would rather only one team have a base and make it a mini siege type game mode. The batteries in the middle of the map would give defenders a reason not to just sit in their base all match as well.

Paul Inouye, on 09 August 2018 - 10:02 AM, said:

• More reward kickers based on player behavior.
  
• Objective play reward increase.
  
• Rewards for CalltoArms participation

This is one of the main reasons I don't play FP on a regular basis. I recorded my payouts for a bunch of FP matches, calculated my c-bills earned per hour and found that the contract payout you get from winning can double your income. This would be fine if matches were even chance to win however FP lacks any form of matchmaking meaning that most matches are decided before they even start. It could actually be better for me in terms of c-bills per hour to quit a FP match the moment I saw that I was against a 8-12 man and play QP matches while I wait for my mechs to come back. All I want is a simple match score check to determine if a player on the losing team performed above average and deserves their faction payout. Don't give it to players who yoloed in with their 4 mechs and did horribly but give it to those that fought bravely against an unwinnable match. I will happily be the punching bag of large groups if I get paid appropriately for it.

Dailies/Log Ins

Last thing to add here is my desire for daily missions and log in rewards. While events are good and they boost the player count for their duration they do not form habits. For the last couple years I have logged into my Guild Wars 2 account EVERY SINGLE DAY no matter what. I have even set up my phone to remote access my desktop so I can log in while I was down in Vancouver for Mech_Con.

Their daily log in system made playing their game a habit. Every single day I will at least start the game to get the log in reward and check the daily missions. Some times I pass on the missions because they are not interesting or i don't have time to do them, but most of the time I spend at least 30 minutes to an Hour playing their game every day. Over the years that I have been playing MWO I have never formed a similar habit. While I still play the game on a regular basis it is not a part of my routine and therefore sometimes gets forgotten about until a few days go by and I remember that I haven't started it up in a while.

༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GIB DAILIES ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ

Edited by Kanajashi, 09 August 2018 - 12:23 PM.

[Eisenhorne]

Kanajashi, on 09 August 2018 - 12:11 PM, said:

This is one of the main reasons I don't play FP on a regular basis. I recorded my payouts for a bunch of FP matches, calculated my c-bills earned per hour and found that the contract payout you get from winning can double your income. This would be fine if matches were even chance to win however FP lacks any form of matchmaking meaning that most matches are decided before they even start. It could actually be better for me in terms of c-bills per hour to quit a FP match the moment I saw that I was against a 8-12 man and play QP matches while I wait for my mechs to come back. All I want is a simple match score check to determine if a player on the losing team performed above average and deserves their faction payout. Don't give it to players who yoloed in with their 4 mechs and did horribly but give it to those that fought bravely against an unwinnable match.

A "Pyrrhic Victory" bonus would be amazing, if you do double the average matchscore of your team in a loss or something. Maybe a special title / skin / warhorn or something for it. It would be next to impossible to do in group play, but easily doable if you're the one of the few "really good" players on a losing team. Would also encourage solo pugging of good players, since if you try really hard to carry and still fail, you still get rewards.

*edit - Of course this would simply encourage some players to farm damage even harder... guys who bring nothing but LRMs and ERLL's to pug matches and sit in the back farming damage while their team dies. You know who you are....

Edited by Eisenhorne, 09 August 2018 - 12:19 PM.

[UnKnownPlayer]

Paul Inouye, on 09 August 2018 - 10:02 AM, said:

My notes:



FP Update – Notes from the Community
Make faction alignment meaningful and rewarding

• Faction specific rewards (Colors/boltons/cockpit items/skins/etc)
  
• LP used as a currency
  
• Story/Lore/Faction driven choices to cement a desire to stay loyal
  
• Expand on the Loyalist path drastically
  
• Expand on lore in global descriptions in FP

I am NOT a fan of the current system allowing people to swap whenever they want, the penalties could be waived, i wouldn't want people following friends to have rank 19 dropped to 13 or whatever but the current situation of never having an nameable enemy means that there is little to fight for in the larger conflict.
If we had shorter conflict periods you could lock units in to faction for the period (4 weeks or 8 or whatever)
If there is a mini campaign like this weekend allow people to swap or "ally" with one of the 2 sides, swapping in the mini campaigns or in standard conflict should only be allowed for mercs and only if the conflict is seriously one sided.

[Peter2k]

GBxGhostRyder, on 09 August 2018 - 11:40 AM, said:

No salt here bud just stating what I see as maybe the #1 problem in FP as far as new player retention and the almighty fun factor that hooks you on a game mode or game.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


It might work for a few weeks maybe a few months but once player start to understand there going to get rolled by premade teams 24/7 they will just leave the game mode and go back to QP what it is is just a big band aid not a real fix.

I guess what im trying to say is FP-solo mode would be like a entry FP game mode where solo players could just have fun in FP and learn the ropes as far as mech builds and skills and a little teamwork.Then when there ready they could join the FP group queue and play meta buils and the best comp FP play MWO has to offer.

Makes perfect sense to me from both sides of the player base equation.

The list states improving rewards in more than one way, but it also mentions rewarding 12vs12 play, edit: or at least I hope that what is meant with "reward group play at a higher level"

Look
The reality is that playing 12vs12 is hard work and frankly doesn't pay as much as seal clubbing does, everyone likes to win and reap rewards and feel good about themselves bringing home big damage numbers.
A very fine reason why big groups tended to be on the same side all by "coincidence".

In my old days in MS you had plenty of players going yolo how big they are with high damage and kill numbers, some averaging over 4k damage or so the self praise was.
Same players caved in massively when we faced competent 12 man's.

The reality is you need to make 12 means want to face each other over a rag tag band of players.
Cutting rewards for defeating noobs while making competeteive play more rewarding sure would help.

Also I still believe trial mechs should be forbidden.
Having a drop deck you actually own yourself kinda guarantees you have spent a certain amount of time playing.

Edited by Peter2k, 09 August 2018 - 12:29 PM.

[Paul Inouye]

So here's the thing. I have this list plus my doc for queuing and role selection stuff that I will discuss in the podcast. I'll add the TL;DR of my doc to this list and repost in a new thread for follow up discussion. Will talk with Daeron/Phil when a recording time can be set. Intitially the recording was supposed to be earlier this week but with the feedback and discussion going on here, I want to collect as much up front feedback as possible PRIOR to recording. As it seems, there's a good running start here so the recording will be either tomorrow or very early next week. (No holiday Monday this time so we can get cracking quickly.)

I want to thank everyone in the discussion so far and I'll be updating/communicating in THIS thread for now and switch over to the new thread after the podcast.

Note 1: Just because a new thread is being created, you don't need to repost stuff from here to the new one. This thread will remain bookmarked and referenced when moving ahead.

Note 2: The new thread will contain updates resulting from investigation as it goes through the channels.

Note 3: New thread is needed to summarize what was done here in the top post and allow people to run through the summary without having to scan through 24 pages (as of this post).

[Peter2k]

TWIAFU, on 09 August 2018 - 12:10 PM, said:

Better idea, make it so solo are automatically put into a group.

Since this IS THE Teamwork/Unit Queue, participate!!!!

But wouldn't be that the sort of same way we have now?

Solos could work together with groups, groups could work with solos.
But usually there is no comms between them (also quite frankly since groups use a TS and solos aren't on it), and many solos don't even follow.
Forcing them actually into a group does not guarantee they listen more than they do now.

I started to want to be in a group because I wanted to win, not because I had this urge to be told where to go and which target to focus on.
Just saying.


Aside from trying to reward big groups to fight big groups to leave solos alone I'm not sure what you could do that doesn't pi** off a lot of people on either side.

[Jman5]

I don't know if this falls under pie-in-the-sky, but one thing I'd like to see are forward dropzones for some of the big maps so players can jump right back into the fight. Matches would be shorter, but fiercer. There would be less sitting around waiting for the next wave and instead it would be a continual battle.

You could make it just 1 forward dropzone with a max of 4, that is first come first serve. 5th+ players would catch the next drop.

Edited by Jman5, 09 August 2018 - 12:55 PM.

[SuperFunkTron]

Paul Inouye, on 09 August 2018 - 10:02 AM, said:

My notes:

While not all encompassing on every single topic... these are the notes that are in for investigation for the update. These are higher level notes in which if your suggestion touches on the same area, consider your suggestion to be part of the discussion.

FP Update – Notes from the Community
Make faction alignment meaningful and rewarding

• Faction specific rewards (Colors/boltons/cockpit items/skins/etc)
  
• LP used as a currency
  
• Story/Lore/Faction driven choices to cement a desire to stay loyal
  
• Expand on the Loyalist path drastically
  
• Expand on lore in global descriptions in FP

By any chance, is the idea of incentivizing Faction Specific Mechs covered by any of those points? I know Paul has responded in previous town halls as to it being a possibility, but I would like to know if there is a real chance at enhancing the distinction of each faction beyond the current sticker and tech tree being the identifying factors.

[Geg]

While the Queueing in Beta2 SUCKED the faction agency in Beta2 was pretty awesome.

If there was a way to merge the two together that would be kinda nice.

[Geewiz 27]

GBxGhostRyder, on 09 August 2018 - 12:00 PM, said:

Those ideas are great but only part of the solution to the problems FP has or MWO in general solo players have a hard enough time finding info on this forum let alone find teams that's why even back in MechWarrior 2 we has a huge Social lobby on Kali and ten.net then on gamespy for Mechwarrior3 and MW4 Vengeance then the MSN gamming zone for all 3 MechWarrior IP titles.

Players have always learned faster and easier by player to player interactions or group to solo player interaction in this IP that's what made the old PC IP games work so well for player retention and team recruitment and just plain fun chatting and playing stomp robots with friends and family all over the world for so many years.

MWO is such a sterile unsocial game I wont even include it in the pantheon of PC IP MechWarrior games that personally were much more fun overall and im talking multiplayer not solo play.

Mate you could be right about MWO being hard for new players in general and also to join units. I started playing this game 15 months ago, I'm in my 30's this is the first PC game I have ever played. I'm now close to top 10% of game on Jarl's list, was able to work out how to join a unit easily within my first 6 weeks, if some one with no previous game expierence can pick it up and get gud so can everyone else.

[Dyhalto]

I'm not very concerned with the rest of the CW changes but please significantly reduce or remove the cost of player invites to a unit.

[Eisenhorne]

Dyhalto, on 09 August 2018 - 01:24 PM, said:

I'm not very concerned with the rest of the CW changes but please significantly reduce or remove the cost of player invites to a unit.

Is that really an issue? How big is your unit that invites are that expensive?

[justcallme A S H]

GBxGhostRyder, on 09 August 2018 - 10:59 AM, said:

None of this is going to make one bit of difference as long as its Solo players VS premade teams it will still end in a FP ghost town ether split the FP queues like you did in QP or limit premade groups to 2man or a 4 man per side per drop.

[Redacted]

Anyway you split the queue - THIS IS WHAT WILL HAPPEN for at least 12-14hrs of every daily cycle, probably more. Not making it up either, I've a very good grasp of what goes on in MWO/Queues...

[Redacted]

Edited by draiocht, 09 August 2018 - 03:12 PM.
unconstructive, replies removed

[Sereglach]

I don't know if it's been posted before this point, as I focused on Paul's posts over the thread, but here's my 2 c-bills as someone who hasn't had a desire to play FP for a LONG time; and what it'd take for me to be interested again.

What killed it for me was the implementation of the overhauled "Career Selection". Namely, it was the fact that for the premise of a solo player, you were either a Loyalist or a Lone Wolf. For the Loyalist, you were stuck unless you wanted severe penalties. For the Lone Wolf, you couldn't participate in the Mercenary experience in any way. Therefore, a solo player who didn't want to pledge loyalty got zero actual FP rewards for answering call to arms; and the reality is that they still don't. The people that FP NEEDS in order to fill gaps and make matches go off don't get rewarded for being said filler. Whether the competitive/unit players like it or not, players are content in a game like this; and people don't like to play when they don't get comparable rewards for their efforts. The average PUG can earn a lot more of the same rewards in QP then they can earn for the same time investment of FP. On the other hand, reasonable rewards for the efforts can make the average PUG put up with a lot . . . even if they get stomped.

So . . . that leaves the question as to what I'd like to see to fix that?

The simple answer is to treat any lone-wolf player as if they were a mercenary. Whenever they participate in a battle, give them the same Reputation points that they'd get if they were in a Mercenary Unit. It also allows solo players an opportunity to earn Merc rewards without joining a unit or creating one just for themselves.

A better, or at least more unique, solution might be to have Lone Wolves get both LP and RP, just at a slower pace. Maybe earn 30% of the Faction LP that a Loyalist would have earned, for whatever faction they're fighting under (based on planet ownership or attacking faction) as well as 30% of the RP that a Mercenary would earn for fighting the same battle. However, this solution also seems significantly more complex to implement.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On another note, I'm all for "drop pod spawning" . . . or just spawning in on a selected zone during various game modes. In fact, I see it as a way to improve both FP and QP. If it is something that can be implemented in FP, how possible would it be to implement such a system in QP to make matches last longer and be more objective based? For example, if a team has 100 "drop tickets" to complete the objective (Domination, Conquest, etc.) and assaults respawn at 4 tickets, heavy 3, etc. that could do a lot to help alleviate some QP woes (round a corner and get vaporized, lucky cockpit, etc.) and make objective play more important. After all, wouldn't this system be done to the QP game mode versions found in FP? Just a thought.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Anyway, there's my 2 c-bills on FP. Thank you for your time and consideration.

[Starwulfe]

justcallme A S H, on 09 August 2018 - 12:09 PM, said:

Population reset / dynamic numbers.

+1
Changing to dynamic or at least a reset is mandatory to help with population balance.

[justcallme A S H]

Starwulfe, on 09 August 2018 - 02:26 PM, said:

+1
Changing to dynamic or at least a reset is mandatory to help with population balance.

Yeah it was one of the bigger bug-bears I totally forgot about actually in my initial list that, at least on face value to me, would be a rather easy fix with a few line of code as the data is already there without a doubt. There are others too but waiting until the Podcast for now.

Paul's given a nice clear update so far, looking ok so far. Keen to see what some of the ideas are actually based on it with regards to LP currenty and encouragement on teamwork (imagine that, team work in FP form Solos? )

Edited by justcallme A S H, 09 August 2018 - 03:03 PM.

[Will9761]

Paul Inouye, on 09 August 2018 - 10:02 AM, said:

My notes:

While not all encompassing on every single topic... these are the notes that are in for investigation for the update. These are higher level notes in which if your suggestion touches on the same area, consider your suggestion to be part of the discussion.

FP Update – Notes from the Community
Make faction alignment meaningful and rewarding

• Faction specific rewards (Colors/boltons/cockpit items/skins/etc)
  
• LP used as a currency
  
• Story/Lore/Faction driven choices to cement a desire to stay loyal
  
• Expand on the Loyalist path drastically
  
• Expand on lore in global descriptions in FP

Map Alterations

• Revisit sightlines
  
• Revisit pathing
  
• Look at generator positioning

Game Mode/Hooks

• Tug-of-War adjustment for less punitive win condition flips.
  
• Removal of Tug-of-War mechanic for smaller events with different win scenarios.
  
• Incursion base building health adjustments.
  
• Drop Zone wall angle adjustments.
  
• More reward kickers based on player behavior.
  
• Bring back queue count.
  
• Planet/event specific map selection.
  
• Objective play reward increase.
  
• Conquest score adjustment.
  
• Adjust launch countdown.
  
• Earlier win conditions based on team destruction (stomps)
  
• CalltoArms timer change.
  
• Unit based objectives.
  
• Queuing integrated into LFG
  
• Reward group play at a higher level than solo
  
• Scouting mode end condition investigation (diving)
  
• Rewards for CalltoArms participation
  
• Battlefield based tonnage restriction (e.g. only 4 assaults at a time)

Systems Update

• More than 4 drop decks
  
• VoIP prior to drop

UI

• Refresh on friends list
  
• Favorites on friends list
  
• Status indicator (drop type/game area)

Coffers

• Unit management taxation removal/change.
  
• C-bill transfer between players.

Misc

• Tool for players to enter planetary data

NOTE: This list is not a list of things definitely going in. Again, it's a list of investigation points that I'll be presenting on top of what is already in play to see if anything can be included. i.e. NOTHING on this list is promised.

So far, I like what I see. However since we are in 3057, some of the faction personalities in game need to be changed/corrected:

House Davion:
Hanse Davion - Died in 3052 from a stress-related heart attack after being overwhelmed by the Clan Invasion. His replacement should be Victor Steiner-Davion for the Davion half of the FedCom border.

House Kurita:
Takashi Kurita - Died after the Clan Invasion, he should be replaced by his son Theodore Kurita.

House Steiner:
Melissa Steiner-Davion - Died in 3057, from an assassination attempt set up by her daughter. I can't believe I'm saying this, but Katherine should replace her for House Steiner.

House Liao:
Tormano Liao - Died in 3052 by assassination. She should be replaced by Sun-Tzu Liao.

Clan Wolf:
Ulric Kerensky - Died in 3057 during the Refusal War. Should be replaced by Vladimir Ward.

Clan Jade Falcon:
Elias Chrichell - Killed by Vladimir Ward in 3058 after the Refusal War. He should be replaced by Marthe Pryde.

Clan Diamond Shark:
Barbara Sennet - Barbara Sennet was the SaKhan of Clan Diamond Shark not the Khan. Therefore, Ian Hawker should be the Shark Khan as Barbara only became the Khan after Hawker committed suicide in 3060.

Edited by Will9761, 09 August 2018 - 03:44 PM.

[Panthros]

Why isn't going back to the faction only maps on the list? It was very frustrating to play quick play maps in faction warfare. That is why I left faction play, not sure about everyone else.

Edited by Panthros, 09 August 2018 - 04:16 PM.