222 replies to this topic

[FRAGTAST1C]

Couldn't we have a filter, like there is for the servers, for Solo players to either play as a Solo or be allowed into Group queue or both? What's the harm in that?

[Khobai]

FRAGTAST1C, on 09 June 2019 - 08:33 PM, said:

Couldn't we have a filter, like there is for the servers, for Solo players to either play as a Solo or be allowed into Group queue or both? What's the harm in that?

there is no harm in it. theres no real benefit either though. why would you want to play in group play as a solo player? im just not seeing the incentive there.

Again im not against the idea, but I think to make it work better solo players in group queue would need a rewards incentive. like extra cbills for soloing in group queue.

I also think it would require group queue to have a working matchmaker to prevent it from being flooded with a bunch of solo yolos. That would help solve the issue of casual groups getting beat up in group queue too.

Edited by Khobai, 09 June 2019 - 09:23 PM.

[Nightbird]

There are technical challenges to letting solo players queue in both Solo Queue and Group Queue at the same time (didn't PGI say this is a non-starter?), and zero benefits to the solo player to only queue in Group Queue.

[arcana75]

As a QP main, I don't see any reason to drop into GP as a solo player, unless an event challenge "forces" me into it, as it is already the case for FP-based event challenges.

If I ever have a friend willing to try MWO, I'll first ask him/her to sync drop with me in QP, with both of us using an out-of-client chat program, since we need to keep talking outside of matches.

If I ever needed to witness high-level group play I'll solo-drop into FP. During events there's alot more solo FP players than normal and you can get several games going where it's almost all solo players.

[FRAGTAST1C]

I'm not looking at it in terms of benefits. It's just an option. It also could be a precursor to making a solo player look at GQ and maybe join a group regularly from then on.

Again, it's just an option. It's neither forcing a solo player into a group match nor keeping them away. Everything doesn't need a benefit. It just needs to be there as an option.

[PhoenixFire55]

Just to put it into perspective for some people ...

What is the difference between a group and a bunch of solo players? ... A group uses comms. Comms are available to solo players. Solo players choose not to use them. A group coordinates its actions. Solo players choose not to care about anything but their own stats.

In other words, soloists choose to not give a damn about their team in a team-oriented game. If you ask me, they deserve to get stomped hard. Every. Single. Time.

And in fact the same people who cryed about "waa waa premade OP nerf nao" years back are still getting roflstomped by other solo players who do stuff which helps their team and occasionally use comms. The only difference is that the excuse for their badness has switched from "premades OP" to "matchmaker sux", "crap team", "clams / IS / meta OP", "hacks", "hitreg" and so on and so forth.

PGI has repeatedly catered to bads and thus shafted units time and again over the years. The limit of max players in a group set to 4 was what really killed the game. Because nobody wanted to choose which friends they wanted to play with, and which friends they needed to tell "sorry pal, no space for you". Later they reverted that, but not before 80% of unit population has quit the game for good. Simply because PGI has clearly shown what they care about and what they promote (badness) in their supposed "team-oriented thinking man's" game.

[jss78]

PhoenixFire55, on 10 June 2019 - 12:51 AM, said:

Just to put it into perspective for some people ...

What is the difference between a group and a bunch of solo players? ... A group uses comms. Comms are available to solo players. Solo players choose not to use them. A group coordinates its actions. Solo players choose not to care about anything but their own stats.

In other words, soloists choose to not give a damn about their team in a team-oriented game. If you ask me, they deserve to get stomped hard. Every. Single. Time.

And in fact the same people who cryed about "waa waa premade OP nerf nao" years back are still getting roflstomped by other solo players who do stuff which helps their team and occasionally use comms. The only difference is that the excuse for their badness has switched from "premades OP" to "matchmaker sux", "crap team", "clams / IS / meta OP", "hacks", "hitreg" and so on and so forth.

PGI has repeatedly catered to bads and thus shafted units time and again over the years. The limit of max players in a group set to 4 was what really killed the game. Because nobody wanted to choose which friends they wanted to play with, and which friends they needed to tell "sorry pal, no space for you". Later they reverted that, but not before 80% of unit population has quit the game for good. Simply because PGI has clearly shown what they care about and what they promote (badness) in their supposed "team-oriented thinking man's" game.

Yeah well, we can't all be pinnacles of the community such as yourself.

I'm sure you're an exceptional player of video games, and I congratulate you for this achievement.

[arcana75]

FRAGTAST1C, on 09 June 2019 - 11:51 PM, said:

I'm not looking at it in terms of benefits. It's just an option. It also could be a precursor to making a solo player look at GQ and maybe join a group regularly from then on.

Again, it's just an option. It's neither forcing a solo player into a group match nor keeping them away. Everything doesn't need a benefit. It just needs to be there as an option.

The option doesn't exist thus to add the option it needs to give some benefit otherwise why spend the effort, time, resources to add it in now?

Today a solo player can drop into FP to see group play in action, both the good side and the rough side of a roflstomp due to superior teamwork brought on by usage of comms and following calls. With enough of the good side, said solo players may be incentivised to join a group, or with enough roughage, decide to go with QP exclusively. Even in QP a solo player can see the good and bad sides of a pug 12v12 and decide if (s)he wants something else eg join a unit, then join the unit's Discord/Teamspeak then sync-drop via the out-of-band channel.

Either way, adding a solo option to GP doesn't actually add much by way of options to the solo player, esp when other options are already available.

[Krucilatoz]

Captain Caveman DE, on 09 June 2019 - 05:30 AM, said:

I don't see where the problem with SYNC-dropping is. you can do it right now, you don't have to be in groups for that..
wanna group up because of ""tactics"" (I use this term losely in mwo)?
go to gp/fw. it is there - use it.

just sync man. it's fun shooting the persons you're in teamspeak with

While I'm extremely happy to shoot my friend back there, but sync drop didnt really work as planned. We sometimes sync drop in 5 - 7 person, and most of the time we splitted in different match.
And, "friend" here is my real-life friend, we usually chat in Whatsapp group then drop together into MWO

zerosouL, on 09 June 2019 - 06:57 AM, said:

If you want a group stomping grounds experience theres GQP, FP, Comp and various Tournaments for you. We dont need solo QP to become another stomping/positional meta camping grounds.

Stomp will always happened, group or solo.
Then thats why it is irrelevant.


-----
What we really wanted here is for a group of people to play together, preferable in the same team.
Thats what we think makes MWO (or any other game) is fun,
nothing beat the fun of mocking your friend in-game while spectating, or laughing at their own stupidity, sometimes we giving away his location to enemy just to annoy him:D

[FRAGTAST1C]

Krucilatoz, on 10 June 2019 - 07:24 PM, said:

nothing beat the fun of mocking your friend in-game while spectating, or laughing at their own stupidity, sometimes we giving away his location to enemy just to annoy him:D

You'll get reported for that by someone else.

[Lykaon]

PhoenixFire55, on 10 June 2019 - 12:51 AM, said:

Just to put it into perspective for some people ...

What is the difference between a group and a bunch of solo players? ... A group uses comms. Comms are available to solo players. Solo players choose not to use them. A group coordinates its actions. Solo players choose not to care about anything but their own stats.

In other words, soloists choose to not give a damn about their team in a team-oriented game. If you ask me, they deserve to get stomped hard. Every. Single. Time.

And in fact the same people who cryed about "waa waa premade OP nerf nao" years back are still getting roflstomped by other solo players who do stuff which helps their team and occasionally use comms. The only difference is that the excuse for their badness has switched from "premades OP" to "matchmaker sux", "crap team", "clams / IS / meta OP", "hacks", "hitreg" and so on and so forth.

PGI has repeatedly catered to bads and thus shafted units time and again over the years. The limit of max players in a group set to 4 was what really killed the game. Because nobody wanted to choose which friends they wanted to play with, and which friends they needed to tell "sorry pal, no space for you". Later they reverted that, but not before 80% of unit population has quit the game for good. Simply because PGI has clearly shown what they care about and what they promote (badness) in their supposed "team-oriented thinking man's" game.

You are not wrong. A bit salty over it maybe. But we both have a similar perspective.

When there was a mixed queue of solos and groups there was also a lack of many of the features we have now.

For most of the time we had a shared quick play queue there was no match maker to speak of no in game team VOIP and LFG system.

And before any of that was developed to maturity the queue was split. So instead of resolving to build a functional shared queue PGI capitulated to the tsunami of conformation biased fueled solo player tears flooding the forums.

I believed the final iteration of the shared queue was something like...

4 players max group size
1 group per team (or maybe it was 4 grouped players max per team so 2x 2 players groups was allowed)
8 solo players.

Anyhow,what this meant was the vast majority of matches that included groups at all were composed of two thirds solo players.

So how is it possible for groups to "farm" solo players if two thirds of a team the group belonged to were solo players? Wouldn't any victory achieved by a team with a group in it's composition result in a victory for twice the number of solo players as there were grouped players?

Yet this format was also unacceptable to solos because the other team in any match that lost included an equal number of losing solo players as there were winning solo players on the opposing team.

The solo players had become so toxic to the scapegoated groups that wins were always forgotten ONLY the losses counted and ALL loses were NEVER a solo players fault it was ALWAYS the fault of a group playing against them that caused the loss so they were "Farmed" and certainly not losing due to the other team collectively playing better.

I have been playing this game a very long time.I played in groups and I played solo and over the passing of time this game has gone from who played best wins to who was slightly less stupid than the other team wins.

When the groups got removed from playing with solo players the dynamic of tactics and cooperation were replaced with the state we have now.

Victory is not earned it occurs.

We run in a circle and allow the matchmaker to determine the majority of the matches outcome. We have chosen to not retain agency on how we play but allow a matchmaker to throw together 12 players on a team and hope the team we are assigned is better at running in a circle than the other random team.

Now the solo players complain about a terrible match maker it's not that NASCARing removes player agency or that collectively failing to recognize what a loss looks like before it happens and refusing to adapt is not a failing in a match maker. It's a failing in players to even recognize what went wrong and altering practices to adapt in the next match.

Players still lack the ability to see the source of their issues is not entirely someone else's fault.

[Krucilatoz]

FRAGTAST1C, on 10 June 2019 - 07:28 PM, said:

You'll get reported for that by someone else.

That's why I play with my friends, real-life friends,like in one or two lance,
and we simply chill over such jokes among us.

And don't worry, we never do such thing to unknown player

[Kotzi]

A box to check if you want to be matched in GQ as a solo player. Easy solution, might help.

[PhoenixFire55]

Lykaon, on 10 June 2019 - 07:49 PM, said:

For most of the time we had a shared quick play queue there was no match maker to speak of no in game team VOIP and LFG system.

And before any of that was developed to maturity the queue was split. So instead of resolving to build a functional shared queue PGI capitulated to the tsunami of conformation biased fueled solo player tears flooding the forums.

I guess the question is what would have happened if VoIP and other whatnots have been implemented back then before the queue split. But somehow seeing how puggers don't bother to use VoIP now that they have it I doubt it affected much.

You can call me salty all you like, but I am quite frankly disgusted by the fact that some solo pugger who doesn't bother improving his game, doesn't bother to communicated with his team in a team-oriented game and so on, somehow thinks he is entitled to wins against people who do improve and do communicate. And the worst part to me and to many others, is that PGI has clearly shown that it also thinks that they are and caters to that. A "thinking person's team-oriented shooter" that promotes cluelessness and soloism. No wonder 95% of playerbase are long gone.

[FRAGTAST1C]

PhoenixFire55, on 11 June 2019 - 12:41 AM, said:

You can call me salty all you like, but I am quite frankly disgusted by the fact that some solo pugger who doesn't bother improving his game, doesn't bother to communicated with his team in a team-oriented game and so on.....

It is weird that when I start playing MWO a few months ago, Tier 5, T4 and even T3 to some extent had plenty of players who actively used comms. Now, it's the opposite. You'd think that high tier players would use comms more than anything but that doesn't happen. There's more NASCAR in higher tiers as well. I could bring my Kraken in Tier 4, call targets and lead the push right into the enemies' heart and watch my team willingly share armour and follow up whereas now.....

[PhoenixFire55]

FRAGTAST1C, on 11 June 2019 - 02:39 AM, said:

It is weird that when I start playing MWO a few months ago, Tier 5, T4 and even T3 to some extent had plenty of players who actively used comms. Now, it's the opposite. You'd think that high tier players would use comms more than anything but that doesn't happen. There's more NASCAR in higher tiers as well. I could bring my Kraken in Tier 4, call targets and lead the push right into the enemies' heart and watch my team willingly share armour and follow up whereas now.....

Higher tiers doesn't mean higher skill. It simply means more games played. More games played creates an illusion that you know what you are doing, and apart from that also creates a general tiredness of the game, of the bads around you and so on. All that usually means less talk. Well, useful talk anyway, and more salt.

[Nesutizale]

Quickplay = solo, Factionplay = group...at least that was the plan IIRC. So groups in solo...no thanks.

As for coms beeing used.Funny thing is that since FP is called dead I had quite an increase in people actualy talking and taking command and others folloiwing. In that regard the problems in FP helped for quickplay...what is frankly a sad thing.

While I like more communication I feel bad for those who left FP.

[TheCaptainJZ]

The queues should be merged, but in the way the new FP MM works. Groups put on opposite sides until groups are exhausted. Then smaller groups that are mismatched and solos are matched. Done.

[Lykaon]

Nesutizale, on 11 June 2019 - 06:31 AM, said:

Quickplay = solo, Factionplay = group...at least that was the plan IIRC. So groups in solo...no thanks.

There are many many flaws in this thinking as it pertains to the longevity and overall population growth/maintenance of this game.

To many independent queues spread the population. If we have a solo quick play,a group quick play,a Faction play,solaris and competitive queue we have the population spread pretty thinly.Add to that regional servers and we have North America/Europe and Oceanic servers further diverting player concentrations.

The above problem leads to a looser match maker that now has to use what ever is available to build matches so the PSR tier spread in each match is wider than is likely healthy.

It also leads to increased wait times for any of the queues that have lower population resulting in less matches played overall and an overall reduction in enjoyment (unless you like sitting in queue for 15 minutes to a half hour)

And then there is the simple fact that quick play and faction play are structured very differently.

Queuing up for solo quick play is basically I select whatever mech I want to play press launch and after a brief wait the match maker drops me into a solo quick play match. The whole process can take under 15 minutes ...choose mech..press launch..play..repeat all in under 20 minutes.

Faction play however places a significantly higher demand on your time. Frequently 20 minutes can go by waiting for a match followed by a match that it's self can take 20 to 30 minutes (some longer) You will play fewer games against a much smaller pool of opposition and uses a lower variety of your mechs while doing so. And of course faction play is significantly less casual.

Solaris VII? well that is even more limiting on your options as to what you can play and expect positive results. You have a handful of chassis that utilize a handful of builds.Greatly reduced variety and again a lower pool of piers to play with/against.

And of course the entire dynamic of how the game is played is radically different from quickplay or solaris to Faction play. So if you want to play in a group with friends and also want the game structure in quickplay you need to go play in the group quickplay queue.

What can be said about group quick play ? well it's a shark tank a meat grinder a noob masher. With no match maker to speak of the group queue is not even remotely noob friendly. New players who were attracted to the concept of playing MWo with friends quickly learn that ALL of the available avenues for group play are poorly supported by a match maker or radically different in game play dynamics. The best option for a new player is to play solo...and solo is basically alone and not at all about playing with their friends. They may not stick around and may even pass on a negative review of this game to others.

Not good for population maintenance.

And then there are the potential benefits of grouping and joining player units on the population as a whole.

New players joining units allows assimilation of the new players into a prevailing community culture. Players who form ties within the structures of a game general stay with that game longer. This is one of the primary reasons why other MMoRPG game include guilds/player association and units.

There are many benefits for new players who join a guild in an MMo. They gain access to information,oppertunity and in other games materiel support.

Currently it's a bit of a hoop jump for a new player to find and join a unit.They don't cross paths much in game since groups and solos are on their own islands now. There are no in game methods for solos to search for a unit to join and the LFG tool is heavily under utilized to serve this function.

The plan from the very get go should have been to create a unified community and not a divided one. The devisions should have been tools to drive faction warfare and not strangle population growth.

Edited by Lykaon, 11 June 2019 - 09:21 AM.

[Teenage Mutant Ninja Urbie]

Krucilatoz, on 10 June 2019 - 07:24 PM, said:

-----
What we really wanted here is for a group of people to play together, preferable in the same team.
Thats what we think makes MWO (or any other game) is fun,
nothing beat the fun of mocking your friend in-game while spectating, or laughing at their own stupidity, sometimes we giving away his location to enemy just to annoy him:D

so, rejoice, good man - for that is already in the game.
it's called the group-queue