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Pick Mech After Map


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#1 Sasuga

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Posted 27 February 2021 - 06:40 PM

I would love to be able to select my mech after I know what map and play style we're getting, and maybe even see what my team mates are taking.

I do NOT recommend a tonnage maximum or anything like that for the team, everyone can take whatever they want. If you take all assaults and die to all lights, that's your problem for taking all assaults.

Everyone can have a default mech, sort of like "First Drop" for a drop deck, except they can pick from any mech they have. (Everything you own is your drop deck).

There's a timer until match starts, and if you haven't selected by the time the timer is up, you get your default mech.

I believe this would allow teams to be more tactical, more adaptable, and players to enjoy games better.

If you're stationed on a planet, you'd probably fit your mech out for that planet. This would some-what simulate.

#2 xxREVxx

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Posted 27 February 2021 - 11:01 PM

This suggestion has come up many times.
-PUG matches
-A drop deck to select from prior to drop.
-4 mechs in drop deck are all the same weight class/tonnage.
-4 mechs in the drop deck of the users design. Pilot picks one mech from the four mechs after the map and mode have been voted on.
Basically, you would have a mech available suitable to you for the
map and mode.

Unfortunately, it is ALWAYS the sound of crickets in response from those in development.

Edited by xxREVxx, 27 February 2021 - 11:05 PM.


#3 Sasuga

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Posted 27 February 2021 - 11:47 PM

They should be able to boot strap it somehow with the Faction-Play game mechanics they already have to work with.

#4 FearThePaladin

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Posted 28 February 2021 - 08:31 AM

A drop deck of mechs in the same class should work.

#5 LordNothing

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Posted 28 February 2021 - 10:57 AM

i definitely support the qp deck concept. another alternative is to allow you to pick other variants of the same chassis which might be easier to implement. just put the mech select on the map reveal screen.

#6 Slothasaurus

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Posted 01 March 2021 - 08:47 AM

There is already a place to do that, Faction play.

Not a good idea for QP. There are many people that play that have limited mechs and limited resources. They go with what they have. It might be good for the map it might not be. Now you put them up against people that always have the best weapon loadout and mech for the specific map. At least as it is now they have a chance if they have a good loadout for the map facing someone with something not optimal. Not to mention the enormous impact groups have on matches. Now those same groups will have even more ability to influence a match.

The idea separates the have's from the have not's.

#7 LordNothing

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Posted 01 March 2021 - 04:51 PM

View PostSlothasaurus, on 01 March 2021 - 08:47 AM, said:

There is already a place to do that, Faction play.

Not a good idea for QP. There are many people that play that have limited mechs and limited resources. They go with what they have. It might be good for the map it might not be. Now you put them up against people that always have the best weapon loadout and mech for the specific map. At least as it is now they have a chance if they have a good loadout for the map facing someone with something not optimal. Not to mention the enormous impact groups have on matches. Now those same groups will have even more ability to influence a match.

The idea separates the have's from the have not's.


new players get 4 mech bays and when they finish their cadet tree a 5th bay and a massive influx of cbills. more that enough to pay for a couple of options. more if its class based as you always have 2 trial mechs for each class. they stand to make more cbills if they can bring mechs better suited to the map which is selected. say a new player gets an is lerm boat as their first mech, which they often do. then the map comes up brawly. but if they have a brawly trial they can use instead, they might even perform better and earn more cbills to get them a better mech faster.

only reason new players have such a hard time in fp is because they dont own anything, and so constructing a full deck without any trials is impossible. their first mechs might not max out the tonnage or they might have too much tonnage or have mechs of different tech bases which they cant use at the same time. the problem is only compounded because fp is the only place they can earn more mech bays outside of mc or the rare mech events. of course its significantly less problematic when you only get one drop and you have more than one option, even if its only a couple. its better to have options than it is to get shafted by something out of your control.

Edited by LordNothing, 01 March 2021 - 04:53 PM.


#8 ScrapIron Prime

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Posted 02 March 2021 - 02:49 PM

View PostSlothasaurus, on 01 March 2021 - 08:47 AM, said:

There is already a place to do that, Faction play.

Not a good idea for QP. There are many people that play that have limited mechs and limited resources. They go with what they have. It might be good for the map it might not be. Now you put them up against people that always have the best weapon loadout and mech for the specific map. At least as it is now they have a chance if they have a good loadout for the map facing someone with something not optimal. Not to mention the enormous impact groups have on matches. Now those same groups will have even more ability to influence a match.

The idea separates the have's from the have not's.


From PGI’s standpoint, it would encourage new players to develop more mechs of each weight class, so it’s a suggestion that benefits them. And having a second mech of each weight class ready to go isn’t too much of a heavy lift for players. If you only have one, you use the one, no change from before.

I would approve this. It would dull the pain of dropping on Polar Highlands with an SRM brawler. Posted Image

#9 Sasuga

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Posted 02 March 2021 - 04:28 PM

NOT CLASS BASED

If they make it class based, or just an option between one variant of mech, it defeats the whole purpose of my suggestion. This isn't, "Which Warhammer do you want to use?"

In faction play, I already have four Mad Dogs that I use over and over. People in faction play generally have four of the same mech, or three of the same mech, or whatever. This isn't about that.

This is: If the game is Polar Highlands Domination, I'm going to want either a light mech that TAGs and NARCs or an LRM boat. If the game is Polar Highland Conquest, I'm going to want a light-fast mech that can grab points, or a medium mech that can chase and kill lighter mechs trying to do the same. If it's assault on Polar Highlands I might want to take out an Assault mech and hang back and LRM and guard my base.

If it's Conquest on Terra Therma I may want to take a machine-gun locust out to grab points, or perhaps a low-heat medium mech to fight light mechs with. If it's domination on Terra Therma, I might want to take a heavy or assault mech that has great cooling, to hold that yellow spot.

I don't want to be choosing "Which medium mech do you want?" Over and over.

Honestly, I want every mech I own to be in the quick-play Drop Deck, and then I can fit out each and every mech I own to be map-specialized and use them.

And, yeah, new players won't have a lot of mechs, but they'll have a reason to buy more mechs.

And, new players are likely to play against new players who also don't have a lot of mechs, and have a reason to buy them.

And old players who own nearly every mech will have a reason aside from boredom to play different mechs.

View PostFearThePaladin, on 28 February 2021 - 08:31 AM, said:

A drop deck of mechs in the same class should work.


Why bother with same class? I think every mech you own should be in your QP Dropdeck.

I'd like to take light and medium mechs out for most conquest games, heavy and assault mechs for most assault games, medium and heavy mechs for domination, etc.

I'd like to take a cool running mech on Terra Therma, and hotter mechs on Polar Highlands.

Of course, most people are going to do these things to one degree or another. The meta won't be a meta of a single mech build, but the meta will become what builds are best for what maps.

View PostSlothasaurus, on 01 March 2021 - 08:47 AM, said:

There is already a place to do that, Faction play.

Not a good idea for QP. There are many people that play that have limited mechs and limited resources. They go with what they have. It might be good for the map it might not be. Now you put them up against people that always have the best weapon loadout and mech for the specific map. At least as it is now they have a chance if they have a good loadout for the map facing someone with something not optimal. Not to mention the enormous impact groups have on matches. Now those same groups will have even more ability to influence a match.

The idea separates the have's from the have not's.


It would be a reason for people to get more mechs and equipment. New players are always at a disadvantage, heck, they start with no skills on their mechs, they have a very poor IMO selection of trial mechs to choose from, and they don't own any mechs starting out. They also don't know how lots of stuff in the game works.

New players are generally Tier 5, they'll be up against other Tier 5 players.

As you improve in skills, get better in matches, you go up in Tier, and you face higher Tier players, who may have less mechs or more mechs, but are good enough to be facing off with you on your Tier.

If having the right mech for the map is a benefit, then they'll improve and face other people who also have the right mech for the map.

It'll also make it more fun to create more mech loud-outs. People can and would design specific mechs for specific maps. Instead of just changing mechs because they're bored, they'd actually have a reason to own and use different mechs.

I believe it would breath a lot of life into the game. Because, right now, people pick one build and stick with it, and only change mechs because they're bored and want to try something different. There's no other reason that I don't just own a single mech and use it over and over and over, and over. Which, generally, I often do. I usually play the same mech all day long.

Oh sure, there's a 2x bonus for using a mech you didn't use yet that day, but I don't really care about that when I've got no reason to spend C-Bills anyway. I've got the mech and the loadout I want, it's a mech that works for me on every map. Sure, it's no the best at every map, but if I want to win, I can't even use a different mech as I might end up on a map where LRMs are king and be without my LRMs, or a map where LRMs suck and be LRM heavy, etc.

Players want more mechs? Join Faction play and get more Mech Bays, do special events and get more mechs and mech bays, get C-Bills, buy Mechs. Don't force me to play one mech over and over, only changing mechs because I'm bored, because you're worried that some people have more mechs than others. Getting more mechs is not that difficult in this game, and having different builds for different maps is a reason to own more mechs aside from just collecting them to have them, and using them from time to time just to challenge yourself or not be bored with the same mech over and over.

=-=-=-=

Short of every mech I own being in the QP Drop Deck which I HIGHLY recommend with this post, make it a choice of light, medium, heavy, and assault at least.

So, I can choose a light or medium for conquest, and a heavy or assault for domination.

And, then, I guess I'd have to kit out each so maybe my assault runs cooler for Terra Therma and my heavy runs hotter for Polar Highlands or something.

But really, reward players for buying more mechs.

Making every mech available after knowing the map and mission type would reward people for owning more mechs. Which, I believe would encourage people to buy more mechs, and maybe encourage those new players who don't own a lot of mechs to buy mech packs, aye?

=-=-=-=

And allowing team mates to discuss and see what mechs their team mates are taking after knowing what the mission is, would encourage people to cooperate more.

Oh cure, You're always going to have the salty players who think they know best how to play and complain about what people pick, that's every game, all the time, no matter what.

However, it would allow players to see and say, "I'm taking my missile boat out." and another player to say, "Alright, I'll bring my TAG & NARC Mech."

And another player to say, "Well, the other team is likely to be heavy on missiles as well [Because it's Polar Highlands] I'm going to bring my Kit Fox with ECM and lots of AMS."

And, next thing you know, people are actually rock-paper-scissoring their choices over the map and mission type. Because, yeah, Polar Highlands is great for LRMs... but guess what, people will then pack ECM and AMS for it... which means people are going to need and want direct fire... which means people will start using more direct fire... which means the LRMs will not be used as much... which means AMS and ECM won't be used as much... which means LRMs would be very useful and thus people will start taking LRMs... Which means people wills start taking AMS and ECM... and around and around the Meta goes.

Except the meta will be map based and not just, "Which mech is best?"

It'll become, "Which mech is best for what maps?"

And then, people will start buying those different mechs for when those different maps come up.

=-=-=-=

Also, right now, people build their mechs and then try to pick the map based on their mech they've built. So, everyone picks cold maps, and HPG, and over and over, the same maps get picked.

If people got the map first then picked their mech, maybe different maps would come up more often. Maybe it wouldn't be all these hot mechs and players feeling, "Well, I have to pick an artic map because I built a hot mech."

Granted, everyone running around with hot mechs is another discussion.

It would also help different mission types to come up more often. Because right now, people are picking skirmish all the time, and assault or domination only when skirmish isn't an option. Why? Because they've designed their mechs to be killers, and that's it. They are all about that damage and not the mission objective, and they don't want to be an assault mech that loses to a light mech that caps their base. They don't want their heavy and hot mech to lose on consequent.

If people picked the mech after the map, they might actually play the actual mission types, and coordinate more, instead of simply skirmishing every match even when the mission type isn't skirmish because their mechs are just designed to be skirmish over and over.

=-=-=-=

Heck, I'd love it if the missions and maps went back to the old days when people couldn't vote for the maps and missions (and I was one who recommended voting on maps and missions back in the day) if we could pick our mech for the missions after we know what the mission and map is.

I'm also entirely ok with map and mission selection remaining as is.

But, my point is.... let us choose our mechs for the map and mission, instead of the mission and map for our mech.

It rewards players for owning more mechs. It opens up a whole new level of meta-discussion. If players can discuss their mech choices before the match, it encourages team play and cooperation (you take your LRM boat, I'll take my NARC. You take fast mechs to grab points, I'll take a medium to hunt the enemy lights...)

It's win/win/win.

And, yeah, new players will be at a disadvantage, but they can play with other new players who are disadvantaged, and new players are always, in every game, at a disadvantage when they're new. It comes with being new.

Edited by Sasuga, 02 March 2021 - 04:51 PM.


#10 GlyphKnightMax

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Posted 02 March 2021 - 05:17 PM

Matchmaking is already a mess with tonnage as it is. This would only make that worse. I've had matches of 1-2 assaults vs 5-6 on the enemy team before, and unless we have an entire light lance that's perfectly coordinated, we lose on tonnage and armor and firepower. I even had a match of SEVEN enemy assaults vs my team that had NO assaults. That pug pulled together like nothing I've ever seen, and we won somehow.
This idea, the ability for all players to pick whatever they want regardless of tonnage, is not going to work without some kind of limitation. I much prefer the idea of going into QP after selecting a class of mech, then selecting which mech in that class to bring in during the wait time before the match starts. And even that much DOES put new players at even MORE of a disadvantage. No skills, no good choices on mechs yet, no experience - versus someone who has all the skills for their mechs, can choose from a huge arsenal for what fits that map best, and the experience to leverage those resources.
It is strictly unfair, and no amount of subjectivity in your argument will change that.
If you want this to be a NEW playlist - then that would just divide an already small community, so I can't even recommend that.

What I CAN recommend, in the spirit of your suggestion, is this: A QP deck that isn't tonnage based, but mode based. You get a slot for each game mode, put a mech in for each, and when a mode is chosen, you know which mech you'll load in as. That's the closest you might get to a compromise on this one without giving me flashbacks to Waframe's community of "Well, I'm a veteran player, and you need to make the game appeal to me, even though I never buy your currency at lower than 75% off, and already have everything. You can forget bringing in new players who have a reason to buy, don't know about the discounts, and will recommend the game to others while they're bright-eyed and happy with the game instead of aware what a mess the end-game - or lack thereof - is."

Gives me conniptions.

#11 LordNothing

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Posted 02 March 2021 - 10:23 PM

there are a number of ways to implement this feature, any of which is better than what we have now. some things to think about. deck restrictions being one. same tonnage or same variant doesn't interfere with the mm, same class might (im not really sure if the mm cares about tonnage or class). all in is a bloody mess where you break 4444 and you can switch from a 20 tonner to a 100 tonner willy nilly. some restrictions to play nice with the mm are a good idea.

there are asset loading constraints to think about as well. fp has shown that the game can handle 24 players to each have 4 mechs in the same drop (and longer load times to boot). even if you are only dropping in one of them, the game would have to have the assets for all 4 ready to go, it can not predict what you will choose. though it does allow pgi to just copypasta decks from fp with minor modifications, but you are capped to 4 mechs. otherwise mech selection would need to happen between the map vote and the map load, in which case the game need only load assets for the mech you have selected. but you do need time to select your mech, more if you have a lot of options. there is ui work involved too. these things limit the number of mech options you have and cost of implementation.

there is the matter of recouping cost of implementation. selling decks is a good way to do that. obviously new players would get some starter decks, like the 2 you get for fp (4 if you count the scouting decks that never made any sense to begin with). but being able to purchase more decks for example to get 8 options instead of 4, or for organizational purposes.

whatever rules you have for building a deck, you need a ui to build and select decks for your drop. adding a qp tab to the manage drop deck ui is the easiest way to solve the first problem. thats a copypasta job mostly, though the deck building rules are different. fp lets you pick your default deck, but i dont see that being very good for quick play, where you might change deck a lot. perhaps a short cut where if you drop with a mech that is in a deck, it automatically loads that deck, otherwise you drop with only that mech. being able to launch the game from deck select is a must, and the option to edit the deck at load time would probably be removed to keep quick play quick.

Edited by LordNothing, 02 March 2021 - 10:23 PM.


#12 Sasuga

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Posted 03 March 2021 - 12:27 AM

View PostGlyphKnightMax, on 02 March 2021 - 05:17 PM, said:

Matchmaking is already a mess with tonnage as it is. This would only make that worse.


How?

View PostGlyphKnightMax, on 02 March 2021 - 05:17 PM, said:

I've had matches of 1-2 assaults vs 5-6 on the enemy team before, and unless we have an entire light lance that's perfectly coordinated, we lose on tonnage and armor and firepower. I even had a match of SEVEN enemy assaults vs my team that had NO assaults. That pug pulled together like nothing I've ever seen, and we won somehow.



I don't see how your argument has anything to do with picking mechs after mission objective and map has been picked. If anything, I think people knowing the mission and map before the mech will help bring more verity to matches, not less.

View PostGlyphKnightMax, on 02 March 2021 - 05:17 PM, said:

This idea, the ability for all players to pick whatever they want regardless of tonnage, is not going to work without some kind of limitation.


I've already been in matches where one team had nearly all assaults and the other team had nearly all lights. And, in each of these matches the light mechs won. So, what does it matter if there is no tonnage limit? People can already pick whatever tonnage they want now, they just don't know what the map and mission is going to be.

Moving it so people can pick their mech AFTER knowing the mission and map, isn't going to affect what your complaining about or seem to be afraid of, at least not in any negative way I can see. So, why bother limiting tonnage? Let the other team go all assaults, and we'll go all lights and rip them apart.

View PostGlyphKnightMax, on 02 March 2021 - 05:17 PM, said:

I much prefer the idea of going into QP after selecting a class of mech, then selecting which mech in that class to bring in during the wait time before the match starts. And even that much DOES put new players at even MORE of a disadvantage. No skills, no good choices on mechs yet, no experience - versus someone who has all the skills for their mechs, can choose from a huge arsenal for what fits that map best, and the experience to leverage those resources.


NO, because I don't want to be in an assault mech on a conquest mission. Which means, I generally never play assault mechs, and other people tend to never pick maps and missions that assaults aren't good at because they've already picked assault and don't want to play conquest in an assault.

The whole point of my suggestion is, to allow people to pick mechs for the mission objective (and map), so it's not everyone picking assault, then picking only maps and missions for their assault. Because a lot of players pick assault, then pick maps and missions for assaults, because they're locked into an assault already. It's always the mission type closest to skirmish right now, because everyone's kitting out their mechs to be fit for skirmish, and then picking missions closest to skirmish. I'm making a suggestion that flips the script to flip the mentality, so it's not just assaults everywhere.

I do not want to be locked into a weight class before picking the map and mission. I want to pick from a light, medium, heavy, assault after knowing what the mission is... because, guess what, then I'm more likely to pick a light mech, etc. Especially if I can talk and coordinate with my team mates and we can for a plan ahead of time.

The very reason we need to be able to pick the mech AFTER knowing the map and mission is the alienate the very problem you're describing. Your idea of forcing people to pick a weight class first will only continue the problem we have, the very problem you're describing.

View PostGlyphKnightMax, on 02 March 2021 - 05:17 PM, said:

What I CAN recommend, in the spirit of your suggestion, is this: A QP deck that isn't tonnage based, but mode based. You get a slot for each game mode, put a mech in for each, and when a mode is chosen, you know which mech you'll load in as. That's the closest you might get to a compromise on this one without giving me flashbacks to Waframe's community of "Well, I'm a veteran player, and you need to make the game appeal to me, even though I never buy your currency at lower than 75% off, and already have everything. You can forget bringing in new players who have a reason to buy, don't know about the discounts, and will recommend the game to others while they're bright-eyed and happy with the game instead of aware what a mess the end-game - or lack thereof - is."

Gives me conniptions.


What do I care about your flashbacks? Also, I've spent money on Warframe and on Mechwarrior Online. I've spent hundred of dollars on this game, for, guess what, MECHS. And I want an excuse to use my mechs aside from, "I'm bored with the same mech over and over, so I guess I'll try this other one, even though I usually get stuck in situations where it's not worth it."

No, I don't like your suggestion or "compromise."

My suggestion is to alienate the super heavy drops we're seeing now, and hopefully encourage people to play other game modes aside from Skirmish or Skirmish adjacent since they haven't already picked their assault mech build for skirmish and went into queue with it, and now don't want to play conquest or assault because they are afraid to do so in their assault mechs that they're already stuck with.

View PostLordNothing, on 02 March 2021 - 10:23 PM, said:

there are a number of ways to implement this feature, any of which is better than what we have now. some things to think about. deck restrictions being one. same tonnage or same variant doesn't interfere with the mm, same class might (im not really sure if the mm cares about tonnage or class). all in is a bloody mess where you break 4444 and you can switch from a 20 tonner to a 100 tonner willy nilly. some restrictions to play nice with the mm are a good idea.


Yes, if people can pick their mechs after knowing the mission and map, they're more inclined to pick lights and mediums, to fit say, a Conquest game.

Instead of first picking Heavy and Assaults, and then picking Skirmish or Assault because their Assault they've already picked isn't good in Conquest.

View PostLordNothing, on 02 March 2021 - 10:23 PM, said:

there are asset loading constraints to think about as well. fp has shown that the game can handle 24 players to each have 4 mechs in the same drop (and longer load times to boot). even if you are only dropping in one of them, the game would have to have the assets for all 4 ready to go,


Not necessarily. The mission objective and map could be selected from what is essentially the mech lab / homepage client or part of the client. Then, the players can select their mech from that same client, and then that information is fed to the battle-map part of the client.

Since players won't be dropping in after dying, the battle-map part of the client only needs the information of what map to load and what mech you selected, just like it does now. It doesn't need to know what other mechs you own or any of that.


View PostLordNothing, on 02 March 2021 - 10:23 PM, said:

it can not predict what you will choose. though it does allow pgi to just copypasta decks from fp with minor modifications, but you are capped to 4 mechs. otherwise mech selection would need to happen between the map vote and the map load, in which case the game need only load assets for the mech you have selected. but you do need time to select your mech, more if you have a lot of options. there is ui work involved too. these things limit the number of mech options you have and cost of implementation.


Well, they could shoe-horn it with the current Faction Warfare setup, allowing everyone to have one light, one medium, one heavy, and one assault to choose from. It's now what I would prefer, but it would be a start and better than what we have now.

View PostLordNothing, on 02 March 2021 - 10:23 PM, said:

there is the matter of recouping cost of implementation. selling decks is a good way to do that. obviously new players would get some starter decks, like the 2 you get for fp (4 if you count the scouting decks that never made any sense to begin with). but being able to purchase more decks for example to get 8 options instead of 4, or for organizational purposes.


If a player's bench is the mechs they own, that encourages them to buy more mechs. That way, they can build a mech for each map and mission type combo, and have a reason to use them all aside from boredom with their 'main' mech.

View PostLordNothing, on 02 March 2021 - 10:23 PM, said:

whatever rules you have for building a deck, you need a ui to build and select decks for your drop. adding a qp tab to the manage drop deck ui is the easiest way to solve the first problem. thats a copypasta job mostly, though the deck building rules are different. fp lets you pick your default deck, but i dont see that being very good for quick play, where you might change deck a lot. perhaps a short cut where if you drop with a mech that is in a deck, it automatically loads that deck, otherwise you drop with only that mech. being able to launch the game from deck select is a must, and the option to edit the deck at load time would probably be removed to keep quick play quick.


UI is usually the easiest thing to implement in a game, aside from making it look good, which MWO current doesn't IMO. It needs a UI overhaul, for a while now.

I've seen somewhat into their UI, as I've played with my drop decks while a match was loading, and didn't notice the match was loading in the background. I'm sure the UI can handle it.

=-=-=-=

LOOK, I'm getting tired of running Summoners and Huntsmen in every match I want to win, because if I don't, odds are I'm not going to win. I don't want to play a close ranged light mech and get stuck with that on Polar Highlands, or a mech without jump jets on Mining Collective or Canyon Network, I don't want to get stuck without a PPC on Frozen City, or stuck with LRMs or maybe not get stuck with LRMs on Solaris City.

Giving people the ability to pick what mech they want after the mission and map has been selected will give people:

1. More thoughtfulness in the choices of the mechs they build and choose for maps.
2. The ability to be prepared for the mission, as a defending and an attacking force would have.
- "Ah, we're attacking this planet but have no idea how hot or cold it is, or what the terrain looks like. Good luck!"
- - Dumbest commander ever
3. A reason to own more than one mech.
- Right now, I could sell all my mechs except the Huntsman and just play my Huntsman, which I got for free, forever. There's no reason for me to even own other mechs, other than I get bored of playing the Huntsman. But then, I get pick a mech to play that's different, get a bad map for it, lose, have a bad experience, and decide I'm bored with MWO and don't even want to play it any more, and move on to other games.
- Which is exactly what I did, until COVID19 happened and I was stuck at home for a bit and came back to it. (After having spent hundred of dollars on this game, for additional mechs, which I never even use! Because, why would I!?)

I have no reason to use a Jagermech, no reason to take a flea out, no reason at all to use most of my mechs. I don't want to play a flea on Canyon Network, and I don't want to play a flea over and over again hoping to get a decent map for me to use it on. Some people primary flea, great! Good for them. I don't want to do that.

I've already skilled up most of my mechs, I don't need to play them to skill them up, and the ones that aren't skilled up I don't care to do so because, I don't need them, and don't play them. They might as well be figurines. I don't want all my mechs but the one I play with to be a figurine.

Think about it, you generally play the same mech over and over don't you? Then, you pick missions for that same mech, over and over, don't you?

Assault mechs aren't all they're cracked up to be. If it's a team of lights vs. a team of assaults, I'd rather be on the team of lights.

#13 Sasuga

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Posted 03 March 2021 - 12:35 AM

I am tired of playing the same mech over and over because I'm afraid of getting a bad map with a different mech.

I'm tired of everyone else picking skirmish all the time because they're already locked in as assault mechs.

I'm tired of getting on conquest maps and my team mates are all too damn slow to play the mission.

I'm tired of every game basically being skirmish because everyone picks mechs for skirmish, then selects the skirmish mission because they've already picked a mech for skirmish.

I'm tired of owning all these mechs that I paid money for and having no reason to use them aside from feeling bored with the one mech I basically play over and over with because it's the one that works for me best on every map.

=-=-=-=
Attacking forces would have intel and pack accordingly.

Defending forces garrisoned there would generally be fit for that map.

I want to be able to choose from light, medium, heavy, and assault, so I might pick a light once and a while for good reason, and others might too.

I am tired of picking the fast and agile mech, simply because most people seem so bent on picking assault, that I'm the only reason we win, if we win, in matches like conquest.

#14 LordNothing

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Posted 03 March 2021 - 01:29 AM

prisoners should have to develop ui as part of their sentence, it is hell. people always assume its easy, but its a matter of tedium. like i wrote a serial terminal in lua. just a simple utility to print serial spewage. that was maybe 20 lines of code as a cli, the ui was like 400 lines. dont handwave it away as simple.

anyway i think using decks is the way to go. most of the work is done there. the way you would have it done has a lot of far reaching complexities that effect everything from match making to map/mode voting to event ordering. currently it goes, select mech, drop, matchmaking, map/mode vote, map/mode reveal, load, wait and then play. if you want mech select to go in the wait section, you might have a lot of loading to do, but we know the game can handle four each at the expense of load time. if you want it to go before the load say on the map/mode reveal, then your selection goes on the load manifest and all the other clients are told what assets need to be loaded. these things are workable, frameworks exist, no reordering of the sequence, you just add a single step somewhere. k.i.s.s.

but you want to select the map and the mode then select the mech, i guess delete voting so thats gone. skip right into the load, but wait, we forgot about match making, thats kind of important. perhaps we can delete that too. just find all the people who want to play map-mode combo and stick them into a game. just wait for 24 of them who want to play the same map and the same mode at the same time. player numbers are increasing but not enough for that to make sense. if by some miracle the match starts, then you end up with a far swinging array of skill levels and vastly different tonnage between the teams, and match quality suffers. its a dev nightmare. you want to have your cake and eat it too.

the core of the idea is great, many a player including myself has asked for something like it. but it needs to fit into the existing framework without massive redesign (and from a studio that takes 90 days to do an xml change). if you can re-use existing features, code and ui assets, you have done most of the job already. four options are better than zero, maybe pay for more. thats the best you can hope for round these parts.

#15 Sasuga

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Posted 07 March 2021 - 06:39 PM

View PostLordNothing, on 03 March 2021 - 01:29 AM, said:

prisoners should have to develop ui as part of their sentence, it is hell. people always assume its easy, but its a matter of tedium. like i wrote a serial terminal in lua. just a simple utility to print serial spewage. that was maybe 20 lines of code as a cli, the ui was like 400 lines. dont handwave it away as simple.


1. I'm a programmer (and I hate programming).
2. In theory they're being paid to do it.
- The company makes their money from us, or not, but the programmer in theory is being paid to get it done if the company tells them to.

View PostLordNothing, on 03 March 2021 - 01:29 AM, said:

anyway i think using decks is the way to go. most of the work is done there. the way you would have it done has a lot of far reaching complexities that effect everything from match making to map/mode voting to event ordering. currently it goes, select mech, drop, matchmaking, map/mode vote, map/mode reveal, load, wait and then play.


Peak at their code:
Go into a group and not be the leader of the group.
Ready up, then go to "Manage Drop Deck" and wait.
And, wait however long it takes for your buddies to tell you that you've found a match.
Have you buddies talk to you in-game as well via voice, when the match starts.
And notice how you're still in the 'manage drop deck' screen.
Close "manage drop deck" screen and enjoy your quick play match.

Still that being said, I'm sure they can shoe-horn it into what is likely spaghettis-code using the drop deck feature that already exists.

View PostLordNothing, on 03 March 2021 - 01:29 AM, said:

ot of loading to do, but we know the game can handle four each at the expense of load time. if you want it to go before the load say on the map/mode reveal, then your selection goes on the load manifest and all the other clients are told what assets need to be loaded. these things are workable, frameworks exist, no reordering of the sequence, you just add a single step somewhere. k.i.s.s.


You're assuming you know how their code works, and thinking the game has to load every mech into the match or something to give access to every mech. Based on things I've seen, your assumptions are wrong. Basically every mech is already loaded and thus doesn't need to be loaded, from what I've seen. They're just data on a drive somewhere until they're loaded into memory. And not every mech has to be loaded into memory. Nothing needs loaded into memory until just before it's being used.

If you were respawning this would be a bigger issue, like in faction play.

I'm pretty sure the reason they picked four mechs in faction play is more to do with gameplay and game balance than game-engine issues.

Based on what I've seen there's no reason why every mech you own can't be part of your quick-play drop deck. And the only reason to make it a limited number of mechs would be some gameplay thing that I think it counter-productive to the idea of owning more mechs and having mechs (mech-fits) for every map and game-play style.

View PostLordNothing, on 03 March 2021 - 01:29 AM, said:

but you want to select the map and the mode then select the mech, i guess delete voting so thats gone. skip right into the load, but wait, we forgot about match making, thats kind of important. perhaps we can delete that too. just find all the people who want to play map-mode combo and stick them into a game. just wait for 24 of them who want to play the same map and the same mode at the same time. player numbers are increasing but not enough for that to make sense. if by some miracle the match starts, then you end up with a far swinging array of skill levels and vastly different tonnage between the teams, and match quality suffers. its a dev nightmare. you want to have your cake and eat it too.

the core of the idea is great, many a player including myself has asked for something like it. but it needs to fit into the existing framework without massive redesign (and from a studio that takes 90 days to do an xml change). if you can re-use existing features, code and ui assets, you have done most of the job already. four options are better than zero, maybe pay for more. thats the best you can hope for round these parts.



I'm not even going to finish reading all of that, but again, say... Load up into a group, ready up, then go to "Manage Drop Deck" and wait there until you hear voices in the game and your buddies tell you that you're in a match.

You'll learn that your assumptions are wrong, as voting will take place while your on the screen. The game will load onto the game map while you're on that screen.

Which means, they only need to bring that screen up (with a little bit of programming for it and more) after map selection has happened. Then let you pick your mech and then let you ready up.

Try it, I dare you and everyone reading this. Unless the dev's change something before you do it, it'll work. It's happened to me several times while playing around with my drop-deck waiting for a quick-play match.

#16 Sasuga

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Posted 07 March 2021 - 06:58 PM

That previous post is too long people aren't going to read it.

Everyone try this:
1. Get into a group (you need to be in a group for this.
2. Ready up.
3. Tell your buddies to talk to you via voice when the match is connected in-game.
4. Open "Manage Drop Deck"
5. Wait.
6. Wait.
...
7. Eventually you'll find a match, and if your sound and buddy(ies) are working, you'll hear them (and probably others) talking to you. While you're still in the "Manage Drop Deck" menu, LOOKING AT YOUR ENTIRE MECH COLLECTION.





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