15 replies to this topic

[Maj Destruction]

After getting comfortable in lights, Conquest went from my least favorite mode to most favorite. There's just one thing that bugs me about it.......

I can't count how many times I've spent most or all the round frantically zipping around capping points, sometimes actually pulling out a victory last-man-standing when my team was losing, only to get a negative pilot rating because I didn't rack up a big damage score or get enough assists/lance in formation/protected light/etc. Fortunately I gave up any notion of advancing in ratings long ago, so I don't really care, buuuut.....it would be absolutely maddening if I were trying to advance. (I'm just a casual gamer dad who plays MWO mostly with my kids now and then, I have neither the time nor inclination to make a full-time job out of this.)

Now that I mention it, the pilot rating thing in general seems wonky. Just had a game where I scored mid-200s and spent most of my time running around harassing people who were engaged with my teammates, lots of formation work, finished the game last man standing while fighting the last two opponents (I lost). It felt like a lot of work, but I got a down rating. I know, mid 200s is not much even in a Flea, but there have been plenty of other games where my team was killing it, and all I had to do was take pot-shots at opponents who were getting lit up and were probably gonna die anyway.....I get mid 200s to mid 300s, but I end up with a decent pilot rating increase.

I'm really not complaining I understand programmatically assessing a player's value and performance in a game is really tough. Perhaps I'm just looking at it the wrong way.

Matt

Edited by Maj Destruction, 03 December 2022 - 10:08 PM.

[martian]

Maj Destruction, on 03 December 2022 - 10:07 PM, said:

After getting comfortable in lights, Conquest went from my least favorite mode to most favorite. There's just one thing that bugs me about it.......

I can't count how many times I've spent most or all the round frantically zipping around capping points, sometimes actually pulling out a victory last-man-standing when my team was losing, only to get a negative pilot rating because I didn't rack up a big damage score or get enough assists/lance in formation/protected light/etc. Fortunately I gave up any notion of advancing in ratings long ago, so I don't really care, buuuut.....it would be absolutely maddening if I were trying to advance. (I'm just a casual gamer dad who plays MWO mostly with my kids now and then, I have neither the time nor inclination to make a full-time job out of this.)

That is why you should both cap and fight to help your team win the game in the first place. Do not spend the game capping to the exclusion of everything else.

Check this screenshot of Conquest game on Grim Plexus, please:



Note that both me and the Locust guy spent the same time capping and countercapping bases around the map.

But I returned to help my team in combat. So I added four kills, some damage and assists, flanked a bit, protected friendly 'Mechs - you know, the usual stuff. The Locust guy, not so much.

All these combat activities help both your team to win the game (and thus your hopes of getting the victory bonus) and you personally to get a good Match Score and thus hopefully the green arrow of the PSR boost.



In the end, I got 434,213 and 2,235 XP which I believe is not so bad.

But of course, you do not have to heed my advice. I am just telling how I do it, if I have the opportunity.

Maj Destruction, on 03 December 2022 - 10:07 PM, said:

Now that I mention it, the pilot rating thing in general seems wonky. Just had a game where I scored mid-200s and spent most of my time running around harassing people who were engaged with my teammates, lots of formation work, finished the game last man standing while fighting the last two opponents (I lost). It felt like a lot of work, but I got a down rating. I know, mid 200s is not much even in a Flea, but there have been plenty of other games where my team was killing it, and all I had to do was take pot-shots at opponents who were getting lit up and were probably gonna die anyway.....I get mid 200s to mid 300s, but I end up with a decent pilot rating increase.

I'm really not complaining I understand programmatically assessing a player's value and performance in a game is really tough. Perhaps I'm just looking at it the wrong way.

Matt

Your Match Score is compared with the Match Score of your team mates. In one game MS 250 can be enough for the green arrow, in the next game you can get the red arrow for the same MS - it depends on how the rest of your team fared.

[Maj Destruction]

I didn't know pilot rating was based on my score relative to my team, that's good info. Thanks!

As to cap'ing and fighting....yes, of course that's the idea, but that sorta falls apart when we're getting out-cap'd and losing the game. Like I said, there have been rounds where my team got shredded, so I reverted to just cap'ing, and actually managed to win the round (particularly when the other team just decides to forget the game mode and play like a skirmish). Ah well.

Matt

[feeWAIVER]

martian, on 03 December 2022 - 11:31 PM, said:

Check this screenshot of Conquest game on Grim Plexus, please:

NB4 this becomes a Groups vs Solo's thread.

[martian]

Maj Destruction, on 08 December 2022 - 07:20 PM, said:

I didn't know pilot rating was based on my score relative to my team, that's good info. Thanks!

Imagine it as a list of 24 players, sorted according their Match Score (the players of the victorious team get a small bonus) after the game. The upper 12 'Mechs get the green arrow, the lower half of the list gets the red arrow. The higher you are among the "green" 'Mechs, the higher is your PSR raise. The same is true for the "red" Mechs - in the negative sense, of course.

Thus, in one game MS 250 can be good enough to place you in the upper half of the list, and in the next game the same Match Score could place you in the lower half of the list.

Maj Destruction, on 08 December 2022 - 07:20 PM, said:

As to cap'ing and fighting....yes, of course that's the idea, but that sorta falls apart when we're getting out-cap'd and losing the game. Like I said, there have been rounds where my team got shredded, so I reverted to just cap'ing, and actually managed to win the round (particularly when the other team just decides to forget the game mode and play like a skirmish). Ah well.

Matt

If you are getting outcapped, that usually means that only a part of the enemy team is actually fighting your team in the centre of the map. The rest of enemy 'Mechs is running around the map. This is the right moment to attack the core of the enemy team and wipe them out. After your team does it, you can afford to send a pair friendly 'Mechs to every base and recap it.

Of course, I have experienced some games where going capping is the only alternative, if I see that my team is falling apart quickly. However, in my experience this usualy works on large maps only.

[KursedVixen]

Ontop of all of this you earn LESS points for damage and killing then you do on say assault or Skirmish.


So what is more important? Tell us PGI WHAT IS MORE IMPORTANT?!!?

Edited by KursedVixen, 08 December 2022 - 11:07 PM.

[feeWAIVER]

KursedVixen, on 08 December 2022 - 11:06 PM, said:

Ontop of all of this you earn LESS points for damage and killing then you do on say assault or Skirmish.


So what is more important? Tell us PGI WHAT IS MORE IMPORTANT?!!?

Are you saying you earn less match score per damage done on Conquest?

[martian]

KursedVixen, on 08 December 2022 - 11:06 PM, said:

Ontop of all of this you earn LESS points for damage and killing then you do on say assault or Skirmish.


So what is more important? Tell us PGI WHAT IS MORE IMPORTANT?!!?

If you concentrate on killing enemy 'Mechs and dishing out the damage in Conquest the same way as you would when playing Assault or Skirmish, you will get the same rewards.

After all, many players play through Conquest without spending a second on cap.

[Teenage Mutant Ninja Urbie]

martian, on 09 December 2022 - 03:18 AM, said:

After all, many players play through Conquest without spending a second on cap.

and most of the time, that'd be the correct way to WIN in that mode:
shoot a red-guy till he's dead, instead of capping point 4 or 5

Edited by Teenage Mutant Ninja Urbie, 09 December 2022 - 05:27 AM.

[Thorqemada]

Very sadly the only gamemode that is not about stupid killing only is a gamemode that gives out most reward for stupid killing only!

Find the flaw...(it was killed by voting bcs b4 voting only people who wanted to play Conquest did so and played actually most of the time Conquest - after voting people who do not want to play Conquest are forced to play it and they do not bother but play it like Skirmish and the reward mechanic actually encourages it).

[VeeOt Dragon]

yeah i honestly think that you should get more rewards for capping and such. i always pick game modes with alternate win conditions (mostly because it pisses me off when you have match where some light mech (its usually a light mech but not always) runs off to hide and shut down at when his his team has lost just to drag out the match and preserve his oh so important K/D. don't get me wrong if you have a guy that is last mech standing and he is actually fighting (you know peak in get a few shots then run off before they get a fix, rinse and repeat.) thats fine its the folks that run off and hide just because they are either down on weapons or whatever cowardly excuse they have. (hell i had one hell of a match the other day when we were losing badly and i was almost all alone (in my Legend Killer Rifleman i think, it was one of my riflemen at least) and i saw how things were going and just said **** it and Ramboed into the enemy getting 4 kills and bringing the match to i think an 8/12 loss instead of a 4/12 in a matter of about 30 seconds. yeah i died in the end but hell was it fun. there was one mech left after i died and he was one of those lights that was just running away (he couldn't as the enemy had a light faster than him left, but that didn't stop the guy from just running instead of tuning to shoot a mech that had an open CT when he was nearly full health)



-Edit-- oops sorry sort of went off topic and rambled there

Edited by VeeOt Dragon, 09 December 2022 - 07:56 AM.

[LordNothing]

qp conquest is best played in cap 3 and fight fashion. if you are the team that fails to take an initial 3, you need to focus on battle for a few minutes. if it gets past 450-500 then you need to think about capping again. sometimes you can slaughter the enemy team while they try to cap if you move fast and fight agressive.

its better in a decked mode when running out of time usually happens before running out of mechs and it becomes more about map control and less about breaking mechs. you can also split up capping duty by staggering your light drops. some go for initial caps and some reserved for future back cap.

that said map objectives are pointless if they pay zilch and only serve to set the cadence for fighting (which is worse in qp, perhaps lights should spread, cap one each and form a wolfpack to hunt the enemy lights). perhaps cap value should go up as either the difference between tickets and/or live players is high in the enemy's favor. cap when you are behind for more points.

[Meep Meep]

I resign myself to losing psr on conquest because I will tell the team to stay grouped near theta and I will go get the outer caps. If they listen and most of the team stays grouped I can quickly cap two or three points then return to the center and farm some damage and kills and maybe maintain or get a gain. Then if they die in a fire I can try to keep one cap ahead of the other team though if they have a few fast movers left its usually a wasted effort. Of all the modes conquest takes the most coordination which means in quick play its a total dice roll.

[martian]

Teenage Mutant Ninja Urbie, on 09 December 2022 - 05:26 AM, said:

and most of the time, that'd be the correct way to WIN in that mode:
shoot a red-guy till he's dead, instead of capping point 4 or 5

It really depends on the exact circumstances.

Sometimes, when you are seeing right from the mission start that your team is going to lose ... it can be a good idea to go and cap as many bases as you can, while the enemy team is busy with demolishing your team, to win on caps.

[JediPanther]

VeeOt Dragon, on 09 December 2022 - 07:56 AM, said:

yeah i honestly think that you should get more rewards for capping and such. i always pick game modes with alternate win conditions (mostly because it pisses me off when you have match where some light mech (its usually a light mech but not always) runs off to hide and shut down at when his his team has lost just to drag out the match and preserve his oh so important K/D. don't get me wrong if you have a guy that is last mech standing and he is actually fighting (you know peak in get a few shots then run off before they get a fix, rinse and repeat.) thats fine its the folks that run off and hide just because they are either down on weapons or whatever cowardly excuse they have. (hell i had one hell of a match the other day when we were losing badly and i was almost all alone (in my Legend Killer Rifleman i think, it was one of my riflemen at least) and i saw how things were going and just said **** it and Ramboed into the enemy getting 4 kills and bringing the match to i think an 8/12 loss instead of a 4/12 in a matter of about 30 seconds. yeah i died in the end but hell was it fun. there was one mech left after i died and he was one of those lights that was just running away (he couldn't as the enemy had a light faster than him left, but that didn't stop the guy from just running instead of tuning to shoot a mech that had an open CT when he was nearly full health)



-Edit-- oops sorry sort of went off topic and rambled there

As a light in such a situation I just rambo in and maybe get a lucky shot off on an open mech. I too despise those who run off and power down to hide. People use to use it as a bait and switch powering down hoping a chasing enemy would run by then power on and go after it. A lost forgotten tactic now as all 11 idiots watching just asume you are hiding and bird call you which is only aceptible on discos and afks via the rules.

As for conquest i hate it. So boring to see people still lemming to theta. Even when I bother to set up a mech just for this game mode I'll spend most of an hour in the other game modes with a now under gunned and under skilled weak mech that was skilled for conquest with max cap,sensors and mobility vs the normal fighting skills on most my other mechs build to the other game modes.

[martian]

VeeOt Dragon, on 09 December 2022 - 07:56 AM, said:

yeah i honestly think that you should get more rewards for capping and such.

I quite do not think so.

As it is now, the PSR system separates two kinds of players in Conquest: One group that thinks that the point of MechWarrior games is to shoot other 'Mechs, and the other group that thinks that the point of MechWarrior games is to circle around the edge of the map and stand still in some remote corner of the map.

Both groups of the players earn different match scores in the game and they will end up in different Tiers eventually, i.e Tiers that are the best suited for their respective specific play style.
In theory, they should meet only rarely.

Inflate capping rewards and both types of players will meet often in one game and I guess that neither the first group nor the second group will be happy.