261 replies to this topic

[pattonesque]

General Solo, on 27 June 2021 - 10:21 PM, said:

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

This is basically word salad so I’ll break it down for you.

Better players will usually beat worse players.

Worse players dramatically increase the chances of their losing to better players by seeing said better players on the other team and IMMEDIATELY GIVING UP

It puts them in a loser mindset and that becomes self-fulfilling.

Like, look, very good players do not win 100 percent of their matches. Your weapons do just as much damage to them as theirs do to you. If you go into the fight with the intent to try your best, you stand a way better chance of beating them.

I’m not saying every player is going to suddenly become top tier competitive this way. But like, imagine you’re playing a physical sport, even just a pickup game, and someone on your team goes “UGH it’s that guy, I give up” and stops performing basic functions related to that game — not swinging a bat or not dribbling. This is what a huge percentage of MWO pubbies do and it’s bad for everyone involved.

[pbiggz]

If your first reaction to repeated losses is introspection, you will, eventually, improve.

If, like some of the posters in this thread, your response is not introspection, but instead to spin dramatic conspiracies about how tier 1 players make alts to farm t5 pugs (which is just that, an unfounded conspiracy theory), or that a cabal of ultra competitive forum posters (always implied to be the cauldron, but never outright admitting they are so) are controlling the game balance (somehow) so their favourite mechs are always top of meta (meta being an ever shifting, ephemeral concept relating to, whatever it is you don't like and don't feel like losing to), then you have nothing of value to offer yourself or anyone else. You are just spewing toxic bile. You'll keep losing, and you'll keep poisoning this community, which is already notoriously hostile to outsiders and newcomers.

This is exactly the mentality that, combined with what seemed like dead end development, nearly killed this game completely. The fact that it has already come back from the dead (doubled in population) is absolutely ******* miraculous. Very few games ever get a second chance, even fewer when the game is already one that had a cult following at best. If your impulse is to poison that environment because people killed you too fast, you need to do some soul searching.

[Castigatus]

The Basilisk, on 28 June 2021 - 06:17 AM, said:

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.

Oh great, you're not getting what you want out of the game so it should die, screwing over every player who does enjoy it, on the off chance one you do like comes along afterward.

I hope you realise how utterly asinine that sounds.

And its not 'git gud' to point it out when people are blaming game mechanics or map design or the matchmaker for things that are being caused by their own misunderstandings about how things work. Also, I would be interested to see what you would define as content, since mechs walking around maps shooting one another is the entire point of this game so adding maps and mechs is adding content IMO.

Do you want more game modes, more variety in objectives, different ways to modify the groupings ala Solaris or FP??

What actually is it you want from this game that you're not currently getting in some form?

I'm honestly curious, because right now all I see is a bunch of pointless whining capped off with a monumentally selfiish suggestion.

[Nightbird]

Changes, any changes, benefit good players more than bad players. This is because good players play more, sit down and examine changes, discuss with other good players the impact of changes, and share experiences all at a higher rate than bad players. Bad players either don't play very much, or don't learn very quickly and learn through trial and error. This means after every large set of changes, the skill gap increases due to the difference in lag time between each group of players adapting to the changes.

I'm not saying all changes are bad, but understand that people complaining about the changes/any changes is a given and they're neither wrong nor a small group.

[Moldur]

idk how people ever got these huge numbers of matches because half my time spent in this game (perhaps even more) is the queue. I guess it's more bearable with 2 monitors.

[FrontlineAssembly]

General Solo, on 28 June 2021 - 12:17 AM, said:

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

So now I play alt account, and game PSR to stay in T4/5 so I don't pad their stats.
I make a game of it to have postive W/L but negative PSR for fun.
More fun than food for top tier guys and their stats.

It's not that I cannot get guid , its the principle.
I won't help kill the game through my own actions.



My alt has seen you alt and not alt.
You have nothing to worry about.
Carry on.

So your saying that improving your skills isn't fun? You don't gain any satisfaction for improvement? And I am not using the Git gud argument. I hate that term. It's always used as a form of derision imo. We all need to keep learning and improving. Doesn't matter if your are totally new or a MWO world champ. My main point is that regardless of any changes made by the cauldron. The skill gap would still be there. All the changes really are are tools to be used by the players. How you use them is up to you. It doesn't stack the deck for anyone. If someone has figured out a way to use them better then you..then figure out why or how. This applies to everyone.
And as to you being able to beat ASH etc al solo vs group cue. It's not skill gap that that doesn't allow you to beat them when they are grouped. That comes down to numbers. 1v3, or 1v4 etc. Of course you will most likely lose that if they are covering each other.
And the player count is still going up. So the argument that skill gap is pushing people away is false. I have personally seen players come back that stopped playing several years ago due to what Chris did to weapons balance come back, and be very happy with the new changes. And I am not talking a small number of players either. I stopped playing for basically a year and a half myself due to burnout and stagnation of the game. And also a small issue of living and working in Yellowstone NP where the internet was **** at best. Why try and use the little bit of bandwidth I had on something I wasn't enjoying??? But since the changes were announced I decided to try and comeback to the game. And I'm happy I did. It's fun for me again. And I'm still shaking off the rust of not playing for 1.5yrs. But that's on me not the changes or the game.

[pbiggz]

Anc1ent, on 28 June 2021 - 11:28 AM, said:

Oh we have a Sherlock among us don't we? Because veteran players aren't allowed to make a new account. Putting your lack of wits and being completely offtopic aside, is anything I wrote not true?

Same tired old conspiracies about Soup Queue and "bad matchmaking".

If you stand by what you say, post it on your main so we know who you are.

[pbiggz]

Anc1ent, on 28 June 2021 - 11:53 AM, said:

I deleted my 2 year old account with about 5000 games played a few months after the queue merge despite having ~50 mechs on it including all the most expensive hero mechs... that's how frustrated I was with the game. I came back because I regularly watched streams and videos and it seemed that something started happening... and it truly did... but not in the areas where it was needed the most... Cauldron seems to be pushing their own agenda that fits their own playstyle first and foremost unable to see the big picture. No wonder pretty much all you see nowadays are ppc, gausses and laser vomits. With every decision they make this game plays more like a competitive FPS rather than a mechwarrior game.

And you waited until yesterday to log in to tell us about it.

No sorry, nobody is buying this.

[John Bronco]

Anc1ent, on 28 June 2021 - 11:53 AM, said:

I deleted my 2 year old account with about 5000 games played a few months after the queue merge despite having ~50 mechs on it including all the most expensive hero mechs... that's how frustrated I was with the game. I came back because I regularly watched streams and videos and it seemed that something started happening... and it truly did... but not in the areas where it was needed the most... Cauldron seems to be pushing their own agenda that fits their own playstyle first and foremost unable to see the big picture. No wonder pretty much all you see nowadays are ppc, gausses and laser vomits. With every decision they make this game plays more like a competitive FPS rather than a mechwarrior game.

What is the big picture?

[Scout Derek]

General Solo, on 27 June 2021 - 05:11 AM, said:

Did you know that Jarls can't tell the difference between a new player and an alt account.

https://steamcharts.com/app/342200

Steam only counts steam accounts, not alts unlike Jarls List, and according to steam numbers are down

https://leaderboard.isengrim.org/stats

Many if not most of those new players according to Jarls List can be alts farming skillgap.
No way of telling.
But with Steam an alt user would have to create a new steam account as well to count, as a new user.

Steam charts is highly inaccurate; MWO has both a standalone client as well as a steam client;

Furthermore, Steam charts only tracks Online accounts playing MWO on steam, it will never count accounts that are offline playing MWO (yes, this is a function on steam that actually affected websites like Steam Charts accurately tracking people who play).

Anc1ent, on 28 June 2021 - 11:53 AM, said:

I deleted my 2 year old account with about 5000 games played a few months after the queue merge despite having ~50 mechs on it including all the most expensive hero mechs... that's how frustrated I was with the game. I came back because I regularly watched streams and videos and it seemed that something started happening... and it truly did... but not in the areas where it was needed the most... Cauldron seems to be pushing their own agenda that fits their own playstyle first and foremost unable to see the big picture. No wonder pretty much all you see nowadays are ppc, gausses and laser vomits. With every decision they make this game plays more like a competitive FPS rather than a mechwarrior game.

Is that you Khobai?

[ScrapIron Prime]

Anc1ent, on 28 June 2021 - 11:53 AM, said:

I deleted my 2 year old account with about 5000 games played a few months after the queue merge despite having ~50 mechs on it including all the most expensive hero mechs... that's how frustrated I was with the game.

Okay, here's a question... how does one delete their account? I see no option on the website to do that. Or is that just an exaggerated figure of speech?

[Khobai]

justcallme A S H, on 28 June 2021 - 03:50 AM, said:

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.

Because commandos dont actually get hit by a lot of attacks. They evasion tank. They cause far more damage worth of attacks to get wasted than an assault mech soaks up with its armor/structure. Thats a fact.

Stop trying to downplay evasion tanking like you dont know what it is. We both know you do.

That is why lights are currently much better at tanking than assaults. And again thats all wrong and definitely isnt battletech.

Also youre being disingenuous because youre not soaking 600-800 damage in an assault if you frontally "assault" the enemy team. If you actually try to push into multiple enemy mechs with an assault mech in the current meta you will die instantly. The only way you can soak 600-800 damage in an assault is if you specifically avoid assaulting enemy positions and hide behind cover and attack enemy mechs one at a time as they pop out of cover. Assaults cannot genuinely fill the role of assaulting anymore. They are glass cannon turrets at best.

Nightbird, on 28 June 2021 - 08:05 AM, said:

Changes, any changes, benefit good players more than bad players.

This is elitest nonsense and entirely false.

changes can benefit good or bad players. changes that increase skill gap benefit good players. changes that decrease skill gap benefit bad players.

buffing homing weapons like streaks for example is a change that reduces skill gap and benefits bad players.

buffing gauss rifles on the other hand is a change that increases skill gap and benefits good players.

Cauldron's changes only benefit good players because Cauldron's agenda is to increase the skill gap. Which is exactly why weapons like streaks and ATMs were hit so hard. And weapons like gauss and PPCs were buffed.

Edited by Khobai, 28 June 2021 - 02:00 PM.

[Vindicated]

Khobai, on 28 June 2021 - 01:31 PM, said:

Because commandos dont actually get hit by a lot of attacks. They evasion tank. They cause far more damage worth of attacks to get wasted than an assault mech soaks up with its armor/structure. Thats a fact.

Stop trying to downplay evasion tanking like you dont know what it is. We both know you do.

That is why lights are currently better much better at tanking than assaults. And again thats all wrong.

Wait a minute, you do realize that commandos have had no agility changes of the sort that contribute to spread/negation of damage, specifically acceleration and turn rate. The change is pitch and yaw angle and that is even minor.

If you look at comp matches from a year ago or more pre-cauldron, the notion of the "unkillable commando" has existed for years. You can't blame the commando on the cauldron, that mech has existed forever. If anything, buffs such as clan AC10 being 2 pellet (more PPFLD component) and improving mid-range laser heat (so they can shoot more often) has made more mechs more viable against lights. Sounds like a step towards balance to me.

Also, if your only measure of assault mechs is their ability to tank, what are you running on those? 6 MPL? or worse? You play assault mechs because they can run more firepower than lighter mechs. Not just armor.

So if you're taking damage in an assault mech, you should have been able to deal more in return. Otherwise, you were probably in a bad position where you couldn't kill the enemy before they killed you, or worse flat out unable to return fire. We all know the best position for a UAC 5/10 mech is sitting in ditch in Canyon Network where they get shot at from above from multiple mechs they might even not have the pitch to hit back right? Definitely not a kill zone.

[Khobai]

Vindicated, on 28 June 2021 - 01:59 PM, said:

If you look at comp matches from a year ago or more pre-cauldron, the notion of the "unkillable commando" has existed for years.

yes it has existed for years and shouldve been fixed years ago.

but cauldron has made it worse by nerfing homing weapons like streaks and atms. commandos could be killed by streaks reliably before. now streaks can barely even lockon to them and hardly do any damage.

Quote

Also, if your only measure of assault mechs is their ability to tank, what are you running on those? 6 MPL? or worse? You play assault mechs because they can run more firepower than lighter mechs. Not just armor.

what do you think the word assault means?

the entire role of assault mechs is supposed to be assaulting enemy positions. But how can they do that when they die instantly as soon as they expose themselves to more than one enemy mech?

and assaults dont really have considerably more firepower than lighter mechs anymore. these days even mediums are running 70 damage alphas.

___, on 28 June 2021 - 01:59 PM, said:

Quite to the contrary my good friend. Streaks are difficult to avoid, because they are homing. So if they are good it is a HIGHER SKILL CAP.

No streaks are low skill weapons. when streaks are good it decreases the disparity between bad and good players. It allows bad players to kill good players in lights more easily. Which is specifically why Cauldron nerfed streaks.

streaks arnt difficult to avoid at all either. theyre range limited. when you see a mech with streaks you just stay out of its range and it can literally never hit you with streaks.

the purpose of streaks is to set personal boundaries so lights have to stay out of your streak radius instead of constantly being able to facehug/anklebite you. theyre essentially a deterrent weapon so lights stay away from you.

Edited by Khobai, 28 June 2021 - 02:13 PM.

[Thorqemada]

The changes not only increase the skillgap results toward the more skilled players, they also increase the hardware gap results toward the better equiped players as especially homing weapons can overcome PC hardware disadvantages, or connection disadvantages.

I do not have the feeling that average joe/josephine with average hardware and internetconnection (and there are significant numbers of people who have only one provider choice with next to no service (even in the US)) is something considered.

Bcs in all the years constantly by PGI, or whomever else, all the change usually allways impairs substantially the average joe/josephine players gameplay experience and these players have no obligation to stay to be the plankton for the game on that the Whales graze.

Edited by Thorqemada, 28 June 2021 - 02:13 PM.

[Khobai]

___, on 28 June 2021 - 02:04 PM, said:

Then how did I get tier 1? You do realize that streaks literally HOME in on you, right? Gauss rifles, by comparison, are a walk in the park. One shot that does not change direction, easy.

because they only have a 270m range? or 360m for the clan ones but they do LOL damage. seriously lmao.

all you have to do is press R and if you see streaks you stay away from that mech.

avoiding mechs with streaks has always been a fairly easy matter for lights. unless youre the last two mechs in the matchup but you gotta hope the streak mech will die before then.

again the purpose of streaks is to deter light mechs from being able to facehug/anklebite other mechs because streaks create a 270m bubble that light mechs are afraid to enter. thats why PGI designed streaks the way they did to deter light mechs from facehugging/anklebiting because they knew it was a huge balance problem since a lot of mechs are too tall and dont have the pitch to bend down and shoot lights that are at pointblank range. theyre a personal space weapon for players whos aim isnt good enough to hit lights with other weapons.

Edited by Khobai, 28 June 2021 - 02:37 PM.

[Khobai]

___, on 28 June 2021 - 02:16 PM, said:

I am responding again because you keep amending your post... you speak from a place of obvious skill and hardware privilege when you say that streaks are easy to avoid. Your perception of reality is upside down and backwards, totally warped, when it comes to the plight of the average player.

270m range

Quote

A weapon system that locks on to an enemy, dooming them to a hell of inescapable damage, is the skilled players wet dream. The cauldron have done us all a favor and nerfed this weapon to a reasonable level. Thank you the cauldron

and yet skilled players rarely used streaks even before streaks got nerfed. if you could aim and hit lights with other weapons then other weapons were always better alternatives than streaks.

why? again because streaks are limited to 270m and really only useful against lights and maybe mediums. other weapons have better range and are useful against ALL weight classes. the only players who used streaks were players that couldnt aim well enough with other weapons to hit lights.

cauldron nerfed streaks because they allowed lower tier players to kill higher tier players in lights. Not because streaks were being abused by higher tier players (they were rarely even using them). cauldron nerfed streaks to increase the skill gap between lower and higher skilled players. Cauldron also wanted to increase the power level of lights because they have some bizarre notion that lights and assaults should be equally good in combat.

Edited by Khobai, 28 June 2021 - 02:35 PM.

[justcallme A S H]

Khobai, on 28 June 2021 - 01:31 PM, said:

Because commandos dont actually get hit by a lot of attacks.

That is a player aim issue first and foremost. Nothing to do with the Cauldron.

Most of the fast lights can "evasion" tank if the player is good at avoiding fire from lesser skilled opponents.

The amount of lights I have legged in a single volley @ 500-800m suggests concept of "evasion tanking" - which is simply playing a light in an intelligent manner - comes down to good vs not-so-good aim.

Khobai, on 28 June 2021 - 01:31 PM, said:

Also youre being disingenuous because youre not soaking 600-800 damage in an assault if you frontally "assault" the enemy team. If you actually try to push into multiple enemy mechs with an assault mech in the current meta you will die instantly. The only way you can soak 600-800 damage in an assault is if you specifically avoid assaulting enemy positions and hide behind cover and attack enemy mechs one at a time as they pop out of cover. Assaults cannot genuinely fill the role of assaulting anymore. They are glass cannon turrets at best.

You of all people have absolutely no grounds to call anyone else disingenuous. The majority of your posts are made in complete and utter bad faith, you constantly lie and completely misrepresent information given to you.


Oddly enough last time I played (3 weeks ago, moving house) - I distinctly recall tanking high amounts of damage in Faction Play all night long. One match in an Atlas, pushing into a firing line. Of course rotating armour with our brawlers as that is smart gameplay. None the less we pushed 12 enemies and while I died there was a good 600+ received. Same thing in a Spirit Bear, which despite less armour quirks, is pretty nice with the MASC/Mobilty changes.

Hell even in EmP - 7 v 7 Private Lobbies of late I have been routinely spreading 500-600dmg and that is against the best players with the best aim in MWO history.

Admittadly I am skilled I know how to torso twist and also dead-side to spread damage absorbtion - to say I don't do it or it cannot be done even at the tip of the sprear - I can only assume comes from a lack of understanding.

I have offered numerous times now to help you improve your gameplay and that offer still stands.

As the saying goes - You can lead a horse to water...

[Vindicated]

Khobai, on 28 June 2021 - 02:01 PM, said:

what do you think the word assault means?

the entire role of assault mechs is supposed to be assaulting enemy positions. But how can they do that when they die instantly as soon as they expose themselves to more than one enemy mech?

and assaults dont really have considerably more firepower than lighter mechs anymore. these days even mediums are running 70 damage alphas.

If your only idea of an assault mech is to push blindly and tank damage, news flash, that has been bad gameplay and at a disadvantage for a long time. If you have 2x as much armor and structure, you're still going to die in a few hits to the CT which is not difficult for multiple mechs to do. Exposing against multiple mechs has always been a bad idea. Something I was told by better players is you limit engagement to the number of mechs you expose against so you can win. I think that is the best way to put it.

So on your mention of 70 damage alpha. That's not exactly comparable. Just quickly building mechs as an example. I'll give you this example. 2GR 4ERLL MCII. 74 alpha at range up to about 800m
MechDB - MCII-1 (nav-alpha.com)

Let's say the mech in question is a HBK-IIC-A with heavy larges. 75 alpha, but almost half the range. The gauss ERLL mech will destroy the hunchie in 2 alphas to the CT, probbably even before that hunchie gets into optimal range.
MechDB - HBK-IIC-A (nav-alpha.com)

If you tell people that assault mech is meant to push and win, you're probably going to get laughed at. It's purpose is to find a position with good vision and punish enemy movement/exposure. I assume you are familiar with that concept from the brawler vs sniper thread.

Similarly, a UAC5/10 mech can only do 60 alpha (assuming no jam) but the ability to shoot significantly more often when the other mech is not a problem. Even against a UAC40 (2 UAC20) HBK-IIC (which I've seen you play) you can shoot twice before the HBK follows up. On top of that the numbers don't show the spread due to multiple pellets. And the ANH-2A I'm showing as an example is known for spreading damage between torsos.
MechDB (nav-alpha.com)
MechDB (nav-alpha.com)

[BLOODREDSIN]

Just for the record, ( and because i don't actually know myself ) would someone mind naming each and every "cauldron" member, their role in MWO, their position within "cauldron" the group, and who "cauldron" is working with from PGI to apply these changes?