270 replies to this topic

[Nightbird]

Some related thoughts:

On the loading screen, can display the average tonnage of both teams' drop decks.

For really unbalanced maps like Boreal, can give the defender a modifier to their strength when determining handicaps, like +50% or something. Do a check of all the invasion maps and make a correction if necessary.

Edited by Nightbird, 12 November 2018 - 11:28 AM.

[Jables McBarty]

Yondu Udonta, on 11 November 2018 - 08:01 AM, said:

There's two sides to this, some people mind the humiliation, some people don't mind it as they get to deal more damage which equates to more c-bills. From my experience I think that most pugs would rather maximize their c-bills earnings.

Don't want to derail this thread too much, but I have 12-48 results in mind. It isn't the PUGs who are getting extra c-bill earnings if the game could just as easily ended when the kill counter was at 4-12.

[Jables McBarty]

MischiefSC, on 12 November 2018 - 08:34 AM, said:

I also want to reiterate that this idea has potential benefit and use beyond just FW. You create a framework for balancing teams using tonnage restriction and sliding scale payouts based on your relative team Elo you've got a tool you can use in QP and GQ as well. The idea has a lot of merits across the scale and I think would provide a return on invested cost for PGI far better than Tiers and absolutely more than Solaris has. It functionally puts a difficulty slider into the game players can control themselves, taking higher payout for lower tonnage and in a twisted way offsets the inherent lack of balance between weight classes.

It's not just a good idea it's a balanced idea with benefits across the spectrum with no real negatives and should have a positive impact on player retention.

I really like this idea, especially as generic to MWO.

I'm reminded of Ranked Mode in Dota 2, where you can see the average MMR for each team. It gives you an idea of where you fall in the matchup -- are you the best player, right in the middle, or are you getting carried? With that info you choose your role (support/tank/carry) for that match and play accordingly.

[MischiefSC]

Nightbird, on 12 November 2018 - 11:27 AM, said:

Some related thoughts:

On the loading screen, can display the average tonnage of both teams' drop decks.

For really unbalanced maps like Boreal, can give the defender a modifier to their strength when determining handicaps, like +50% or something. Do a check of all the invasion maps and make a correction if necessary.

Exactly. That's what I'm saying - the mechanic itself is the foundation of a balancing mechanic that can help mitigate the inherent balance issues to various modes, maps, weight classes as well as team vs pug, high skill vs low, etc.

It also does so in a voluntary way. You can either take a penalty to your rewards or scale down appropriately, that it helps reward players for accepting greater challenges either by fighting better groups than themselves while still trying to win or by scaling down based on who they're playing, how and where.

Sure, it's all about the win. However you want your win to mean something. It's why we don't all cap rush every time and certain super-cheesy tactics are avoided by the most successful teams. You want to win but you want it to be one you feel like you earned. The teams that don't do that, well, they don't tend to be the teams that are creating balance issues anyway.

We need to make sure this idea gets in front of PGI. Probably the most reasonable and viable suggestion to improve game balance I've seen in a while.

[Nightbird]

Bump for a super easy to implement idea.

When designing a game, you're not crafting textures and mechanics, you're crafting experiences. You can never replace the latter with the former.

[Major Major Catch 22]

Hazeclaw, on 23 October 2018 - 08:55 AM, said:

4 assassins, what do I win? Lol

It's a great idea, hopefully people wouldnt be too salty from the waves of lights/fast mediums this will certainly bring

I would support a 25 ton penalty per win in a row
so if i won three games in a row and won 3 then i would face a 75 ton penalty for the next fp drop

what do you think?


Also,

Many nights on oceanic side we are down to 30 players whom we all know one another. Usually I and a few others will create a second group whilst our friends stay on one side and keep the first group and go the opposite side to seed a group to fight against.

THis happens 5/7 nights a week during oceanic night time on average.

The point being that if one side of friends win. THen its great to know that they will get nerfed for the next match. IT would REALLY help us get more than two games.

In fact I would and my friends be willing to trial this for a month if you want?

thnaks

[Nightbird]

Major Major Catch 22, on 17 November 2018 - 08:16 PM, said:

I would support a 25 ton penalty per win in a row
so if i won three games in a row and won 3 then i would face a 75 ton penalty for the next fp drop

How would you enforce this? Have a text message that says... um.. you won 3 in a row, we suggest you reduce your tonnage by 75 purtty please?

[Spheroid]

Nightbird, on 18 November 2018 - 07:56 AM, said:

How would you enforce this? Have a text message that says... um.. you won 3 in a row, we suggest you reduce your tonnage by 75 purtty please?

Easy, do it graphically. This is true for either your original topic premise or the poster you were responding to above. The text would update dynamically so that the info is viewable either in manage dropdeck screen before launch or while in lobby. Deep red could indicate a high degree of penalty with pink or off white indicating a lesser penalty. Changes might be needed for color blindness but the idea is sound.

If the penalty was on a per pilot basis you could do it before or after launch. If it was done for the full twelve man team after forming you change while in countdown or lobby.

Edited by Spheroid, 18 November 2018 - 11:46 AM.

[Nightbird]

Spheroid, on 18 November 2018 - 11:27 AM, said:

Easy, do it graphically.

The penalty is for my idea, I wanted to know how Major would do it.

[Spheroid]

Well he suggested -25 tons per consecutive win. Its easy enough to add a counter and have that counter modify the text of my drop deck suggested weight. Players could be visually reminded why there is a penalty with the addition of nested or colored coded symbol. A colored hexagon adjacent the hero or special mech hexagon would show players what stage of the penalty they were in.



It would have to be a money modifier. From a programing standpoint they are not going to give each player a unique dropdeck object with its own hard tonnage limits. That is very problematic and impractical.

Edited by Spheroid, 18 November 2018 - 12:38 PM.

[Nightbird]

Spheroid, on 18 November 2018 - 12:28 PM, said:

It would have to be a money modifier.

How about we let Major reply...

[Spheroid]

[Gully D]

Nightbird, on 18 November 2018 - 07:56 AM, said:

How would you enforce this? Have a text message that says... um.. you won 3 in a row, we suggest you reduce your tonnage by 75 purtty please?

Hey i talked to someone and they said in the past the developers have been against the drop deck tonnage changes as it was hard to program, But
what could be done is a -25% penalty to pay (like absent faction pay) for loadouts not chosen on lower tonnage
The more wins you have the bigger the tonnage and pay penalty

even more fun /complex./diabolical would be the tonnage violation pay penalty
could be given to the other side as participation bonus ?:?

Edited by Gully D, 19 November 2018 - 11:41 PM.

[0regon]

Gully D, on 19 November 2018 - 11:32 PM, said:

Hey i talked to someone and they said in the past the developers have been against the drop deck tonnage changes as it was hard to program, But
what could be done is a -25% penalty to pay (like absent faction pay) for loadouts not chosen on lower tonnage
The more wins you have the bigger the tonnage and pay penalty

even more fun /complex./diabolical would be the tonnage violation pay penalty
could be given to the other side as participation bonus ?:?

Yes Gully, what a simple yet effective way the devs could fix FW.

[vonJerg]

So, more the good player/group is playing they get bigger penalty? Great way to make ppl play more FP

[Nightbird]

vonJerg, on 20 November 2018 - 05:34 AM, said:

So, more the good player/group is playing they get bigger penalty? Great way to make ppl play more FP

Exactly, it's a great way to get more people to play.

[Extra Guac]

He was talking to Oregon, how about you let Oregon respond?

[Daurock]

MischiefSC, on 14 November 2018 - 08:20 PM, said:

Exactly. That's what I'm saying - the mechanic itself is the foundation of a balancing mechanic that can help mitigate the inherent balance issues to various modes, maps, weight classes as well as team vs pug, high skill vs low, etc.

It also does so in a voluntary way. You can either take a penalty to your rewards or scale down appropriately, that it helps reward players for accepting greater challenges either by fighting better groups than themselves while still trying to win or by scaling down based on who they're playing, how and where.

Sure, it's all about the win. However you want your win to mean something. It's why we don't all cap rush every time and certain super-cheesy tactics are avoided by the most successful teams. You want to win but you want it to be one you feel like you earned. The teams that don't do that, well, they don't tend to be the teams that are creating balance issues anyway.

Underlined is the part where i think this thing starts to fall apart a little bit. If the "most successful" teams want to make a win count by NOT using cheesy Rush tactics, this suggestion does the opposite of that. A Good team is either going to Do exactly the same as they do now, and simply take a C-Bill hit, or Start to adopt those Rush-Tactics. Either way, that great team is sgill going to smash that other group just as hard as they do now. The teams that currently rush, and use those cheesy tactics are potentially going to be Rewarded for it, when playing a "Good" team. How is that going to make the games better?

[Nightbird]

Deepfryer, on 20 November 2018 - 09:42 AM, said:

He was talking to Oregon, how about you let Oregon respond?

How can you tell? He didn't quote anyone

Daurock, on 20 November 2018 - 10:01 AM, said:

The teams that currently rush, and use those cheesy tactics are potentially going to be Rewarded for it, when playing a "Good" team. How is that going to make the games better?

How would the rush teams be rewarded for it? They'll get penalized like any other winning team.

Major Major Catch 22, on 17 November 2018 - 08:16 PM, said:

I would support a 25 ton penalty per win in a row
so if i won three games in a row and won 3 then i would face a 75 ton penalty for the next fp drop

I thought about this simple idea for a bit, my biggest issues is that it doesn't take into account both team's strengths.

If your team wins 3 times against pugs and then get a A tier team, would you be happy with the 75 ton penalty when even with full tonnage you would lose?

If your team is winning, but breaks up due to time/sleep etc, and you solo drop the next game, would you be happy with a big penalty that doesn't consider your "team" is much weaker?

[Spheroid]

vonJerg, on 20 November 2018 - 05:34 AM, said:

So, more the good player/group is playing they get bigger penalty? Great way to make ppl play more FP

Actually yes. The mode compels and or requires equipment inequity. Why is it so outrageous to have a per group penalty when strategically sides already differ in equipment and tonnage? Say a mature and successful FP exists sometime in the future. Do you expect attrition not to function? Do you expect faction specific mech rosters not to be in play? Those all modify the conditions of the specific battle across players and factions. Why is wrong to have equipment limits based on who you fight with? You are already being limited quite appropriately in your degree of individual agency.

All that is required of this game is that one or more self balancing factors (lets use tonnage acting with faction territorial control percentage) strive for an equilibrium state via the variable of earnings. The competitive challenge is the degree and speed at which a given group of players finds that equilibrium point on specific fronts.

The natural state of Clan Wolf vs. FRR might result in the FRR being 1/3rd its original size. A bored or poor player would seek to maximize earnings (the end result through which tonnage acts upon) by switching faction or front. Sufficiently wealthy individuals wishing to roleplay a dominant power simply trade accumilated wealth for a temporary ability to ignore the system balance. Obviously they are not immune to these pressures in the long run as new equipment and consumable use have concrete c-bill requirements.

Faction Warfare is a textbook example of the tragedy of the commons, where individual demands of freedom from constraint or modifiers so damages the system that population plummets making gameplay impossible. When major groups switch sides multiple times a day it really does not seem like playing for faction matters. How does it makes sense to fight over a world that you defended less than an hour earlier? It doesn't.

Edited by Spheroid, 20 November 2018 - 12:26 PM.