88 replies to this topic

[Daeron Katz]

C337Skymaster, on 02 December 2020 - 10:52 AM, said:

The other thing that MW2, MW3, and MW4 had that MWO doesn't, and that a lot of other games have, that MWO doesn't, is a plot: a story. The page-turning nature of a well-written story that drives a player to wonder "what happens next?" is a huge force in encouraging a player to learn the game, learn the mechanics, learn how to play, and get better, rather than just giving up. If there's no story to learn, then what's the point of subjecting yourself to learning something you're not good at? Dying repeatedly isn't fun, and if there's no story, either, then what's the point?

Apples and Oranges in my opinion. More appropriate to compare MW5 with MW1-4. MWO is more like World of Tanks, War Thunder, World of Warships, these types of PvP games. Not much story in those games either. I'm not against lore and story in MWO at all, just don't think it's as essential as it is in MW5.

[C337Skymaster]

Daeron Katz, on 02 December 2020 - 12:45 PM, said:

My wife indeed has no interest in BattleTech, or video games for that matter beyond maybe some Mario Kart with our daughter. That being said, she's volunteered to be the Game Master so my daughter and I can play the new BT set we got from Catalyst.

I think respawns are an interesting idea, and could certainly benefit the new player. We'll have to see if that gets traction.

So this lends me to ask: how old is your daughter, and are you willing to subject her to the players of MWO for the sake of viewing the "new player experience" through the eyes of someone who has no idea what a large laser is?

[Daeron Katz]

C337Skymaster, on 02 December 2020 - 12:50 PM, said:

So this lends me to ask: how old is your daughter, and are you willing to subject her to the players of MWO for the sake of viewing the "new player experience" through the eyes of someone who has no idea what a large laser is?

Nah that's not going to happen, but thankfully we are getting that kind of input from friends and family of current players who are sending me that feedback directly. We'll continue to actively seek that feedback as well.

[C337Skymaster]

Daeron Katz, on 02 December 2020 - 12:50 PM, said:

Apples and Oranges in my opinion. More appropriate to compare MW5 with MW1-4. MWO is more like World of Tanks, War Thunder, World of Warships, these types of PvP games. Not much story in those games either. I'm not against lore and story in MWO at all, just don't think it's as essential as it is in MW5.

So a point I made to someone else a month or two ago, is that new-player retention boils down to context in a lot of ways. With regards to War Thunder, World of Tanks, World of Warships, etc, the context is already there: we all learned about World War II in school, and we can all relate to the technology, battles, tactics, to some greater or lesser degree. There's familiarity, there. You know what you're looking at, and what it's supposed to do, and you don't complain when a Zero can't survive a hit, or when a Wildcat can't get a lead on a Zero to shoot at it.

Now take some 12 or 15 year old kid who's never heard of Battletech, never played any of the other Mechwarrior games, just happened to hear about this game from a friend of a friend, or his Dad's Uncle's friend mentioned it over beers at their superbowl party, or something, and decides to check it out. There's no context. There's no familiarity. There's no inherent knowledge about which 'mechs behave in which ways, or why things are the way they are. That unfamiliarity, and particularly having that unfamiliarity be a source of PUNISHMENT (apparently, according to my friend's husband) is going to make it REALLY hard for MWO to attract and keep brand new players who aren't already fans of Battletech and Mechwarrior.

Daeron Katz, on 02 December 2020 - 12:56 PM, said:

Nah that's not going to happen, but thankfully we are getting that kind of input from friends and family of current players who are sending me that feedback directly. We'll continue to actively seek that feedback as well.

As long as you know people in that position who are able to provide that kind of feedback. Hearing about it was eye-opening for me, as well, and it seems like key information for addressing the population problem.

[Gagis]

Note that the current Academy does do a pretty good job at teaching the basics. Old players may not have used it so they don't realize how much better it is than the tutorials were when we got started.

I've explored it out of curiosity and now played with my daughter, and the Academy really does a pretty good job.

I never played older MW games prior to MWO either, instead coming directly from Battletech board game to MWO, and did not feel like I'd have had to play the single players at all to know what is going on. On the contrary, people insistent on playing MWO like it was MW4 seem to be the ones who struggle to learn and struggle to contribute to their teams the most.

[C337Skymaster]

Gagis, on 02 December 2020 - 02:43 PM, said:

Note that the current Academy does do a pretty good job at teaching the basics. Old players may not have used it so they don't realize how much better it is than the tutorials were when we got started.

I've explored it out of curiosity and now played with my daughter, and the Academy really does a pretty good job.

I never played older MW games prior to MWO either, instead coming directly from Battletech board game to MWO, and did not feel like I'd have had to play the single players at all to know what is going on. On the contrary, people insistent on playing MWO like it was MW4 seem to be the ones who struggle to learn and struggle to contribute to their teams the most.

How much did you know and understand from the board game, and how much did that help you in MWO? I'm honestly curious because I have no first-hand idea of what the learning curve is like.

[LordNothing]

Nightbird, on 02 December 2020 - 09:31 AM, said:

Moving cadets to T5 will also greatly increase the incentive for players to create smurf accounts to farm them. If only there is a way to automatically detect smurfs after 1-2 games hmmm.....

accelerate psr seeding greatly during cadet phase.

[Gagis]

C337Skymaster, on 02 December 2020 - 02:49 PM, said:

How much did you know and understand from the board game, and how much did that help you in MWO? I'm honestly curious because I have no first-hand idea of what the learning curve is like.

Its been a couple of years so I might have forgotten some a-ha moments but I had a pretty good idea about weapons and their role in engagement ranges at least. Also had a focus on importance of movement and focused fire, though it turns out movement is more important in the board game than it is in MWO. Controls, twisting, cover and spesific loadouts had to be learned, tho MWO does overlap A LOT with the board game in what kind of loadouts work well.

Oh, and I definitely had learned a healthy respect for the danger of carrying XL engines from the board game. Friends don't let friends run XL.

Edited by Gagis, 02 December 2020 - 03:30 PM.

[G 4 R R E T]

LordNothing, on 02 December 2020 - 03:16 PM, said:

accelerate psr seeding greatly during cadet phase.

NO, please do not. It was a long process to restructure the PSR system from being "XP bar" to the new system. Putting new Pilots in Tier 5 instead of exactly in the middle screws the idea somewhat already, bit is still a must if you want to keep new players.

If every new alt-account gets propelled in the sky and every genuine new player gets condemned to T5 for the foreseeable future on the other hand, we just skew the distribution to the other end of the scale resulting in the same matchmaking problems we had before the whole ruckus with PSR reset. And once that has happened, i do not see a second PSR reset coming soon, so be very careful with your wishes

[Nightbird]

G 4 R R E T, on 02 December 2020 - 03:38 PM, said:

NO, please do not. It was a long process to restructure the PSR system from being "XP bar" to the new system. Putting new Pilots in Tier 5 instead of exactly in the middle screws the idea somewhat already, bit is still a must if you want to keep new players.

If every new alt-account gets propelled in the sky and every genuine new player gets condemned to T5 for the foreseeable future on the other hand, we just skew the distribution to the other end of the scale resulting in the same matchmaking problems we had before the whole ruckus with PSR reset. And once that has happened, i do not see a second PSR reset coming soon, so be very careful with your wishes

Condemned to T5? We want newbies to learn in the safety of T5.

[Z Paradox]

G 4 R R E T, on 02 December 2020 - 03:38 PM, said:

NO, please do not. It was a long process to restructure the PSR system from being "XP bar" to the new system. Putting new Pilots in Tier 5 instead of exactly in the middle screws the idea somewhat already, bit is still a must if you want to keep new players.

If every new alt-account gets propelled in the sky and every genuine new player gets condemned to T5 for the foreseeable future on the other hand, we just skew the distribution to the other end of the scale resulting in the same matchmaking problems we had before the whole ruckus with PSR reset. And once that has happened, i do not see a second PSR reset coming soon, so be very careful with your wishes

with group drops in QP, PSR is inaccurate

[LordNothing]

G 4 R R E T, on 02 December 2020 - 03:38 PM, said:

NO, please do not. It was a long process to restructure the PSR system from being "XP bar" to the new system. Putting new Pilots in Tier 5 instead of exactly in the middle screws the idea somewhat already, bit is still a must if you want to keep new players.

If every new alt-account gets propelled in the sky and every genuine new player gets condemned to T5 for the foreseeable future on the other hand, we just skew the distribution to the other end of the scale resulting in the same matchmaking problems we had before the whole ruckus with PSR reset. And once that has happened, i do not see a second PSR reset coming soon, so be very careful with your wishes

i dont think you understand what i was getting at. i was not suggesting another bubble up mechanic. psr would work exactly the same way. the only difference is your progress is multiplied by a factor which depends on your current cadet phase. say that factor is 10, and you gain 5 points you actually gain 50, now if you lose 5 points you regress 50. cadet phase is only 25 games so it doesnt last long. when all your cadet bonuses are earned the factor becomes 1 and its standard psr from there on out. it could taper off with each bonus earned.

this also counts as an npe feature as players who are playing to the best of their ability are in the correct tier when its over. now its possible to intentionally potato 25 matches and then play at your full ability. but this is easy to detect and those players can be issued bans, or better yet stick them in t1 and set their factor to 0.01. if they dont already belong there they are in for a grueling descent into madness.

Edited by LordNothing, 02 December 2020 - 04:32 PM.

[CFC Conky]

Nightbird, on 02 December 2020 - 09:31 AM, said:

Moving cadets to T5 will also greatly increase the incentive for players to create smurf accounts to farm them. If only there is a way to automatically detect smurfs after 1-2 games hmmm.....

Perhaps, but to what end? A high Tier player won't stay in T5 very long. I suppose some players will want to start a new account over and over again but will those types of players be common or outliers?

Good hunting,
CFC Conky

[DAEDALOS513]

Gagis, on 02 December 2020 - 03:29 PM, said:

Oh, and I definitely had learned a healthy respect for the danger of carrying XL engines from the board game. Friends don't let friends run XL.

Once you gain enough experience, running xl's isn't a problem.. you make up for the downside of running them with good positioning and spreading damage. As it stands with how aggressive and nascar'ish the game is atm.. being slow and/or underpowered is more detrimental than using XL engines..

Edited by DAEDALOS513, 03 December 2020 - 06:56 AM.

[Bowelhacker]

CFC Conky, on 02 December 2020 - 05:00 PM, said:

Perhaps, but to what end? A high Tier player won't stay in T5 very long. I suppose some players will want to start a new account over and over again but will those types of players be common or outliers?

Good hunting,
CFC Conky

There are some deviant ******** playing this game, so their sexual satisfaction at slaughtering newbies is likely to be high... But I don't think it'll be a huge issue.

[Marchello1]

Will there be support for the Russian language ?Ps:google translate

[Trennbull]

Will Russ be replaced as CEO or will he remain in the company in his current position or maybe as an consultant?

[Bistrorider]

Yeah, we're waiting... Everything was already written. (or almost everything)

Consider also this topic.

MWO: Forums - The Faction Play Proposal (mwomercs.com)

[General Solo]

Nightbird, on 02 December 2020 - 04:25 PM, said:

Condemned to T5? We want newbies to learn in the safety of T5.

Or simply enjoy the game at a level suitable
Some will remain T5 as their abilities dictate

And should be protected from even average T2/3 players who are like space marines in comparison to T5 cultists

Spoiler

T1?
Custodes and Primarchs with an EMPra here and their

Edited by OZHomerOZ, 03 December 2020 - 03:57 AM.

[Nightbird]

Looks like Daeron successfully got everyone's hopes riled up. If the final list og updates turn into "Year of Faction Play" though be prepared to shut the servers down...