261 replies to this topic

[LordNothing]

nuttyrat, on 27 June 2021 - 01:04 AM, said:

Not according to active player counts, my dude.

https://imgur.com/a/CfPHSbP

i have a feeling the trend is going to be temporary. they can either continue to feed the growth of the game, or they can phone it in, do the minimum viable thing, and let entropy do its thing again. thing is if they are going to do something more substantial, its better to do it while player counts are high. if you build it they will come, if you build it half ***, they will come, grow disgusted and leave again.

[ScrapIron Prime]

The Basilisk, on 27 June 2021 - 05:45 AM, said:

But the original reason, because its BATTLETECH is absolutely gone.

no, still feels pretty Battletech-ish to me. The fact that mechs can turn or twist faster than they could last month didn’t torpedo the genre.

or are you referring to some other change or mechanic?

[Novakaine]

Alex Morgaine, on 27 June 2021 - 05:08 PM, said:

I just put together a 4HP with 9 lrm5s, Its a blast!
just gotta find stupid or insane things to do

Best troll build evar!

[Khobai]

LordBraxton, on 27 June 2021 - 11:06 AM, said:

The faster the TTK the less fun this game is.

Game was best in 3025 with single heatsinks tbh, slugfest forever.

Cauldron should have buffed mobility and armor first, and weapons last, if at all.

I agree 100%. clan tech being introduced is when this game started to become less fun. clan tech was never integrated properly into the game and CXL is still incredibly unbalanced compared to any IS engine. but then everything they did to try and balance clan tech is what really messed up the game like what they did with all the quirks.

And yes I agree Cauldron did things in the wrong order. Weapons shouldve been buffed last not first. Now Cauldron has to add more defensive quirks to try and counter the faster TTK instead of being able to remove quirks which is what the game actually needed: less quirks.

The Basilisk, on 27 June 2021 - 05:45 AM, said:

Guys, all of you who deny that the game itself hasn't changed due to the last patches are either blind and deaf or so utterly oblivious and jaded that you should considder taking a break for your self to get a correct perspective of reality itself again or you should just stop commenting since you seem simply to be unable to understand what ppl are saying.

Yes the game has changed !
It got faster !
The perceived surviability of mechs dropped to nowhere !
Lights are just footsoldiers now
Mediums feel like micro mechs or elementals
Heavys feel like lights or mediums and the Assaults feel like the Mediums I recall from the start of the game.

Only reason I give this a spin now and then is cuz its an old game I know and shooting other guys faces that aren't so twitchy fast that they have already reacted when I started to lift the weapon makes fun now and then.

But the original reason, because its BATTLETECH is absolutely gone.

Its just a hillarious carricature of mechcombat.
Paste gaudy comicstyle or WoW like graphics over it and nobody would realize the difference till some twitcher or screenshot guy points it out.

Oh...and good work on the Polar map its actualy realy fun even after some playthroughs.

Absolutely.

Assaults die as fast as mediums used to.

Although I would argue certain Lights are like the new assaults. Some lights can evasion tank absurd amounts of firepower. ive seen fleas and commandos run through entire teams and barely get scratched. meanwhile any assault that pokes out in front of 3 enemy mechs dies instantly.

Thats not right at all.

Cauldron claims its because of skill gap and players not being able to aim but they continually make the skill gap worse by nerfing lower skill weapons like streaks and atms. those weapons reduce skill gap when theyre viable. which is precisely why Cauldron hates them.

What really bugs me though is that Cauldron continues to deny/downplay that TTK has gotten lower when everybody intuitively feels it.

Edited by Khobai, 27 June 2021 - 09:21 PM.

[justcallme A S H]

Khobai, on 27 June 2021 - 08:56 PM, said:

commandos run through entire teams and barely get scratched. meanwhile any assault that pokes out in front of 3 enemy mechs dies instantly.

You know Commando's have been doing this forever, right?
You know that if an Assault walks infront in a 1 v 3, it generally gets deleted, right?

It's been the same since I started playing.

In fact it was at its worst when the KDK3 came out and Quad UAC10s were bugged & when NTGs would poptart ERPPC/Gauss at 850m.

Khobai, on 27 June 2021 - 08:56 PM, said:

Cauldron claims its because of skill gap and players not being able to aim but they continually make the skill gap worse by nerfing lower skill weapons like streaks and atms. those weapons reduce skill gap when theyre viable. which is precisely why Cauldron hates them.

Yawn again more misinformation - do you ever stop dude?

You are also very well aware of the situation regarding SSRMs. You are also very well aware they are being rebalanced again --> HERE <-- as I've had to link the explaination to you 3 maybe 4 times now.

You can not longer be taken seriously with continual attempts to misrepresent & misquote what you have been told.

[PocketYoda]

Lower tiers aren't fun after the cauldron changed everything to suit top tiers. And he's right about the ssrms.. anything that may affect lights gets nerfed.

Edited by MechaGnome, 27 June 2021 - 09:53 PM.

[General Solo]

pattonesque, on 27 June 2021 - 11:14 AM, said:

I see this kind of extreme loser mentality in a lot of pubbies and they'd win far more if they stopped immediately giving up the moment they see a name or two they recognize on the other team

While your intent may be admirable, the results speak for them selves, what you say is not meta after all.

A better solution would be to put as you call them, the extreme loser's in matches with other extreme loser's and extreme winner's in matches with other extreme winners's


Instead of like now allowing extreme winner's in matches to farm extreme loser's and basically driving them away , reducing the player base.

Now before someone says but we don't have enough players , I will remind you that we don't have enough players because extreme winner's were allowed to farm extreme loser's in matches in the first place, which resulted in the small population.

First it was Faction play extreme winner's were allowed to farm extreme loser's in matches - That Queue Died
Next it was Group play extreme winner's were allowed to farm extreme loser's in matches - That Queue Died

And so on and so forth , Quick plays (Soup Not Solo Que) is next

Edited by General Solo, 28 June 2021 - 12:06 AM.

[FrontlineAssembly]

If skill gap is a problem for you. Why not try and get the skills to close the gap?????? Most players I see that complain about skill gap. Have very little idea about where to position themselves, or situational awareness. That and builds will go a long way to closing the skill gap for you. And saying the Cauldron changes only favor high tier players is just wrong. Without the changes the cauldron has done you would still be complaining about the same skill gap. The changes work for everyone. It's up to you to make it work for you. Are the changes perfect? No they are not. But it is definitely better then what we had the last 2years of just maintenance being done by pgi. Are there still issue to try and resolve....yes of course. But you have to start somewhere. And so far it's off to a good start. And as for the matchmaker....yes it's kind of a mess. And it does need to be fixed. I will agree with you all there. But I also agree with ASH on the ways to fix it. The whole put people in trial mechs is just a very bad idea. And yes it will kill player growth. And it will just kill QP period. Why would I want to play QP and get tossed into a trial mech possibly when I have spent actual money and in game money to get the mechs I own, and want to play??? Thats just insane....
Ok...stepping off the soap box now. I have given my 2 cents.

[Krucilatoz]

Probably a little late,

but, seeing OP on Tier 1, I can assume that he met enemies which lot harder that he can fight with.
And, the MM assuming he is on T1, match him with another T1 (could be some of the best player), and the game expecting him to carry the team, with probably some T2 on his team.

This just my guess tho, since I went up to Tier 1 mostly solo, with 0.65 W/L ratio.

Anyway, I also found that playing on US prime-time (in their saturday night) is somewhat "easier" than EU-afternoon/night. This translated for me in South-East-Asia to have better chance to win when play on Sunday-morning than anyday in the night.
And the statistic on Jarl somewhat support this guesses, I have > 1.0 WL on March, that when I rather very busy with work and only have time to play on Sunday

[General Solo]

nuttyrat, on 27 June 2021 - 11:22 AM, said:

..... a few things about the numbers presented in Steam that you are not taking into account:

1) Steam reports concurrent players in its client, and not total number of unique players in a day

So was going to leave it be but a few things about what you said'

Concurrent numbers are more useful imo, as concurrent numbers tell you the maximum and minimum number of matches that can be going on at one time across all Tiers and Queues.

Total Numbers can spread across time, it does not show maximum or minimum players playing at a given time.

Also weather using Total or concurrent numbers trends can be observed, Up or DOWN!

But the Big Plus to using steam is that alt accounts are excluded unlike Jarls List.

This is important because their is nothing stopping groups getting their members to create alt accounts on mass to artificially inflate total player numbers on Jarls list or even PGI's own data as even they would find it hard to differentiate between a new player and an alt account.

Where as steam only counts steam users and not alt accounts.

nuttyrat, on 27 June 2021 - 11:22 AM, said:

2) PGI has said on a few occasions that you can take the concurrent number and double it to get roughly what the actual number is (A lot of people still install and play via the stand-alone client)

Well PGI has a strong conflict of interest in this agreement, since it is in their best interest's to show good numbers, especially now with EG7 and all.

Plus like I said before PGI's data includes all accounts, including alt accounts, and PGI are bias towards their bussiness interests and frankly I don't trust what PGI say's much.

Burnt too many times

Where as MWO Steam Charts is independent and counts steam accounts, each steam account only has one MWO account, unless those additional accounts are an alt.

But MWO Steam Charts does not count them alts.

nuttyrat, on 27 June 2021 - 11:22 AM, said:

3) Steam does not give you a total count of unique players in a day or month (this is the important part)

The reason it is important to keep these things in mind is because the Steam numbers, while encouraging, can be a bit misleading.


They don't show you what the player churn is, for example (churn in this context is where some people stop playing and others start playing).
Steam also doesn't report on the very useful metric of new players vs returning players.

To further highlight the challenge of Steam numbers: PGI in its disclosure to EG7 during the acquisition put the number at "tens of thousands of daily players" at a time when MWO was at its lowest. Steam numbers do not corroborate this in any way, however Jarl's does. Jarl's is not perfect though as it doesn't capture the ultra casual player; someone who plays less than 10 games per month.

How is churn and new and returning players more important than concurrent players? Please explain.
Concurrent players tells you how many matches can be formed simultaneously and thus have a bearing on wait times? More similtaneous matches means lower wait times and vice versa.

nuttyrat, on 27 June 2021 - 11:22 AM, said:

To further highlight the challenge of Steam numbers: PGI in its disclosure to EG7 during the acquisition put the number at "tens of thousands of daily players" at a time when MWO was at its lowest. Steam numbers do not corroborate this in any way, however Jarl's does. Jarl's is not perfect though as it doesn't capture the ultra casual player; someone who plays less than 10 games per month.

Totally Correct Steam charts does not corroborate PGI's figure of "tens of thousands of daily players" at a time when MWO was at its lowest.

And this makes perfect sense if thoses players played a match or ten and then stopped playing especially as you said MWO was at its lowest.

In fact since the game was at its lowest as you and PGI said, sprouting figures like "tens of thousands of daily players" is very misleading by both PGI and Jarls List which only shows Jarls List limitations.

MWO Steam charts can not be gamed or decieved unlike Jarls List.

nuttyrat, on 27 June 2021 - 11:22 AM, said:

The reason it is important to keep these things in mind is because the Steam numbers, while encouraging, can be a bit misleading.

https://steamcharts.com/app/342200

Numbers are down!
How is this encouraging?
Numbers down means not good, bad.

nuttyrat, on 27 June 2021 - 11:22 AM, said:

Regarding alt accounts ... I think it is fair to say that some of the new accounts are alts but to claim that most of them are alts is a bit of a reach. Have had numerous new players stop by my twitch streams, and there have been more than a few streamers pick up the game who never played it before.

Anyway, back to the original discussion!

Its is totally reasonable to assume that many new accounts are alts since MWO Steam charts which does not count alt accounts is trending downwards and Jarls List which counts alt accounts is trending upward.

Of course Steam does not count stand alone clients but it shows a clear trend amongst steam users playing MWO.

Anyway, back to the discussion!

[Gagis]

There's absolutely no reason to believe people are creating alts en-masse just to mess with Solo's arguments.

[General Solo]

FrontlineAssembly, on 27 June 2021 - 10:52 PM, said:

If skill gap is a problem for you. Why not try and get the skills to close the gap?????? Most players I see that complain about skill gap. Have very little idea about where to position themselves, or situational awareness. That and builds will go a long way to closing the skill gap for you. And saying the Cauldron changes only favor high tier players is just wrong. Without the changes the cauldron has done you would still be complaining about the same skill gap. The changes work for everyone. It's up to you to make it work for you. Are the changes perfect? No they are not. But it is definitely better then what we had the last 2years of just maintenance being done by pgi. Are there still issue to try and resolve....yes of course. But you have to start somewhere. And so far it's off to a good start. And as for the matchmaker....yes it's kind of a mess. And it does need to be fixed. I will agree with you all there. But I also agree with ASH on the ways to fix it. The whole put people in trial mechs is just a very bad idea. And yes it will kill player growth. And it will just kill QP period. Why would I want to play QP and get tossed into a trial mech possibly when I have spent actual money and in game money to get the mechs I own, and want to play??? Thats just insane....
Ok...stepping off the soap box now. I have given my 2 cents.

Skill gap is an annoyance for me not a problem, but for the game its a big problem when it decreased player numbers

I play ASH and Bowser before in T1 solo queue and now soup queue.

It was more fun to play them in solo queue where I had a reasonable chance to beat them and often did.

But now in soup que with them grouped plus sync droppers the chance of beating them is less reasonable.
Wouldn't you aggree?

Thats no fun

[redacted]

Edited by Ekson Valdez, 29 June 2021 - 12:15 AM.

[Khobai]

justcallme A S H, on 27 June 2021 - 09:48 PM, said:

You know Commando's have been doing this forever, right?
You know that if an Assault walks infront in a 1 v 3, it generally gets deleted, right?

I am aware of that yes. But the fact remains a commando should not be able to evasion tank more firepower than an assault.

Cauldron has actually made the problem worse by nerfing weapons meant to tighten the skill gap like streaks and ATMs and buffing long range PPFLD loadouts and increasing damage in general. That has lead to commandos living even longer and assaults not living as long as they used to.

And yes an assault should certainly lose a 1v3 encounter but it should not get instantly deleted like it does now. Especially not when a commando can run past an entire enemy team and somehow survive. There is something profoundly wrong with that.

Assaults are supposed to assault. If assaults die instantly upon contact with the enemy they cant perform their role of assaulting. If all you can do is push one enemy mech at a time because thats all you can survive that is NOT assaulting; assaults are meant to engage multiple enemy mechs at once and soak up tremendous amounts of damage. A commando actually makes a better assaulter in the current game because it can run in and evasion tank more damage than an actual assault. Assaults are basically just huge glass cannon turrets right now.

Thats one of the reasons the game isnt fun anymore (along with the massively unbalanced teams). Because of this misguided pursuit to try and make lights and assaults equal at combat. Theyre not meant to be equal at combat. Lights are supposed to perform other roles like information warfare which PGI completely dropped the ball on as well as capture objectives which they arnt properly rewarded for doing. Lights are also supposed to harass isolated enemy mechs... not be able to engage half the enemy team and survive it.

Which is exactly why we need better streaks and atms back so lights have more counterplay and have to actually check enemy loadouts for counters before rushing in. Something also needs to be done to help assaults defensively so they can actually tank more damage and perform their assault role. This garbage where assaults die instantly is not battletech. MWO has been turned into some kindve bizarre robot twitch shooter thats a complete mockery of all things battletech. Its been turned into hawken lol. All thats left is a jumpjet buff and then it basically is hawken. except you still die faster in MWO because in hawken you could repair.

Also I definitely think information warfare can at least be partially implemented through the use of quirks. Full implementation would obviously require an engineer. But partial implementation can be done with sensor range quirks and ecm-like quirks that reduce the base range mechs can be detected at (with smaller mechs being more inherently difficult to detect than larger mechs). Since all thats already coded in the game, it shouldnt require an engineer just a solid plan and someone familiar with how the games XML files work.

Edited by Khobai, 28 June 2021 - 01:40 AM.

[Dogstar]

Inatu Elimor, on 26 June 2021 - 08:29 AM, said:

Some suggestions. We have tons of fun in tier 4. Your problem is you are doing to well. How to get there?

*make mech building a priority. Please take your non-meta mechs and see what you can do against all odds. Now here is the real fun and challenge !
*Ignore the skilltree. Waste of time, c-bills etc.
*Be aggressive. Let them kill you early in the game. Getting rid of your aggressiveness is therapeutic.
*Get rid of your ams and all other supporting stuff. It only increases your matchscore
*play at hours you know you get rolled. They are not hard to find; take notice of your matchscore.
*wait till you have my age (60). It's a proven tactic to get your reactiontime lowered.
*have a couple of beers. It definitly increases the fun and lowers your tier for sure !
*It' s not a problem that your teammembers suck because we at tier 4 all suck. What remains is the fun !

You are always welcome with us, cheers !

I was thinking, as I read the OP, that nothing good was going to come out of this tread but this is a gem! Some great advice.

also - aren't 'I quit' threads not allowed?

[Thorqemada]

Have watched this Blood thing competition and man - is that boring!

If it would not be for the conquest mode there would not be any thing going on but extreme long range trading...which reminds me of the cave match in the first MWO copetiton...that one was at least hilarious!

Edited by Thorqemada, 28 June 2021 - 01:48 AM.

[justcallme A S H]

Khobai, on 28 June 2021 - 12:33 AM, said:

I am aware of that yes. But the fact remains a commando should not be able to evasion tank more firepower than an assault.

Considering I can and DO tank extremely high amounts of damage in Assaults.

I am regularly spreading 600-800dng+. No Commando is doing that - end of story.

It's becoming more and more evident lately most of you're issues are purely because you need to improve at the game. You're just simply unable to adapt to the changes. Record some gameplay and post it up. I am happy to show you where you're going wrong. The best oat is you can then stop blaming everything bar yourself for your issues and clear lack of gamesense. I'm sure the majority of users here would be very thankful if that say arrived.

[General Solo]

Thorqemada, on 27 June 2021 - 11:35 AM, said:

Jarls does show new players and it seems the majority of the recent playerspike was returners that outnumbeted new players/accounts by a factor of roughly 8:1 which shows the low hanging fruit effort had some impact yet it did not achieve to ignite any interest in the game outside the "circle of the initiated".

If some of these new players/accounts are in fact new alts it means its...sorry...a blurp in a dead ***.

How Does Jarls show new players?

After all when an existing player pays MC and changes their in game name/handle, Jarls treat it as a new player account.

But its really the same player account with a new name.

Edited by General Solo, 28 June 2021 - 04:18 AM.

[ScrapIron Prime]

It’s not empirical evidence, but when I’m dropping in Tier 3, I do see quite a few accounts with unpainted mechs and no badges walk up to a fight, stop moving when they fire, and generally be inaccurate. That to me says new player rather than alt account. And because I see that regularly now, I would assume a fresh influx of genuinely new players has occurred, rather than a “majority” being alt accounts.

as to an accurate count of such players, Steam is your best bet for counting them. To have an Alt on steam, you need to make a second or third steam account, and that’s a bit of a pain in the toolkit. Alts are easier on non-steam downloads. I would assume, therefore , that a higher percentage of steam accounts are non-alts.

[pbiggz]

There's a lot of **** going on in here right now. Anecdotes are not a substitute for fact and the usual suspects' continual harping on half-truths and invented narratives that let them play the victim are not charming.

The game is changing. It's in the middle of a major rebalance the likes of which it hasn't experienced in years, and the operative term in there is changing, not changed. We aren't done yet. So not only is there readjustment to be had for the changes that have already happened, but there are adjustments that will need to be made for changes in the near future.

I see these threads from time to time and it's always disappointing, because someone's honest critique gets buried under a mountain of discontent, basically entirely posted by 3 or 4 of the same guys, whose express purpose on this forum is to drum up support for arbitrary nerfs to players, or playstyles that they don't like, be that playing in groups or using weapons, mechs, and equipment they don't find fun.

It's possible to have a real conversation about the past and future of this game without flooding the thread with 5 pages of mischaracterizations, lies, and malcontent.

Edited by pbiggz, 28 June 2021 - 06:07 AM.

[The Basilisk]

FrontlineAssembly, on 28 June 2021 - 08:52 AM, said:

If skill gap is a problem for you. Why not try and get the skills to close the gap?????? Most players I see that complain about skill gap. Have very little idea about where to position themselves, or situational awareness. That and builds will go a long way to closing the skill gap for you. And saying the Cauldron changes only favor high tier players is just wrong. Without the changes the cauldron has done you would still be complaining about the same skill gap. The changes work for everyone. It's up to you to make it work for you. Are the changes perfect? No they are not. But it is definitely better then what we had the last 2years of just maintenance being done by pgi. Are there still issue to try and resolve....yes of course. But you have to start somewhere. And so far it's off to a good start. And as for the matchmaker....yes it's kind of a mess. And it does need to be fixed. I will agree with you all there. But I also agree with ASH on the ways to fix it. The whole put people in trial mechs is just a very bad idea. And yes it will kill player growth. And it will just kill QP period. Why would I want to play QP and get tossed into a trial mech possibly when I have spent actual money and in game money to get the mechs I own, and want to play??? Thats just insane....
Ok...stepping off the soap box now. I have given my 2 cents.


Well it seems there are just some ppl wich have a say in this game that are simply unable and unwilling to listen and/or accept what ppl are telling them over and over again.

Exactly that: "but you have to want to gid gud" attitude is what drives players away.
People play games to have fun.
What exactly it is that makes most fun for them varys.
A good company devices games catering a certain genere to a certain user group by beeing able to deliver this genere in as much detail as they can or by deftly capturing the core elements of the whole genere or a sub genere.
MS MW4 was very good at this...even if you considder how simplified its mechlab and lobby system was.
When we look at MWO it started quite good with just catering to the lets shoot each other in giant mechs taken from the BT Universe thing.
But here it realy stops.
They pretended to try to deliver more playable content....sooooooon (some people today realy think more mechs and maps qualify as viable content ... its hillarious) but it never realy came...the game remained in a tweaked alpha state where there are some hints at things you could eventually do with all the stuff you either bought for money or you earned by grinding the queues.
And thats about it.
PPL start playing and farming stuff just craving to actually do something with it and use it...but all they got is some elitists that essentially tell them that what they bought or earned is essentially sh...and they have to use the stuff they deem "good" and play like they deem "good"
Well suprise the only thing that has to "gid gud" is the effin game delivering some content you can finaly use the mechs you bough for.
Realy....just stop blaming lack of game design on players.

I play this game cuz its the only shooter younger than 15 years I know from the insides and because its the only shooter that looks a bit like Battletech.
Would I be sad if it would shut down tomorrow? A bit...sunk too much money in it hoping development would come somewhen down the road...silly me I know...but hey not realy.
What would realy thrill me is the next itteration of MW...online....or even better the next company willing to pick up the genere. MW5 was...since I knew who did it...okish...and HBS did realy realy good on BATTLETECH so there is not only failure out there these days.
So .... MWO....plz let it die already...so a new one can take its place in my lifetime.