47 replies to this topic

[1453 R]

I've seen a lot of people who're salty and buttmad about 8v8 claim that the lowered team sizes "punish teamplay" by making it more difficult to assemble into a Murderblob, and thus win the game by simply being fatter, thicker, and more dense than the enemy.

Allow me to be clear: the Murderblob is not, never has been, and never will be "Team Play."

Mere physical proximity to allies is not teamwork. Teamwork is defined as coordinating one's efforts with others to improve one's odds of success, and the average Murderblob Enjoyer couldn't spell "coordination" even though I just did and the word is sitting there as an example.

NOTHING about the Murderblob is coordinated. 'Mechs in the Murderblob mostly just get in each other's way, denying each other clean shots at the enemy and preventing anyone in the Murderblob from moving/repositioning to respond to the enemy. it is the Clump of Cowardice, and frankly 12v12 and its emphasis on placing seven-plus assault 'Mechs in a giant largely immobile blorte of metal in the vague middle of the map never should have happened.

The Murderblob only works because the game is not set up correctly. Mobility should matter, actual coordination should matter. The only reason you can get away with being the seventh Bane in the ten-Bane pile-up is because the game does not punish immobility, and lightweight machines cannot appropriately counter you when there's fourteen other Banes next to your miserable worthless 600-tube LRM boat to cover you from the Evil Scary Fast Guy. 100-ton Giga Turrets should be a niche build that requires actual coordination to work, no the de facto default.

If you cannot play this game outside of the Murderblob, then you are not a 'team player'. You are a leech who is using your teammates as nothing but ablative shields in the hopes of getting to be That Guy who does all the damage, gets all the kills, and scores all the Internet chicks through the random happenstance of "the Reds shot at everybody else first."

[Void Angel]

This is true, but remember the principle of charity. The murderball isn't itself team play, but it does enable teamwork - it's harder to coordinate with someone who's half the map and (more importantly) two major terrain features away.

Most (nearly all, I'd imagine) of the people who misunderstand that "teamwork" means "defend my LRM boat to the last 'mech" aren't coming to that position because they're selfish - because they deliberately want to feed those teammates into the wood chipper while they farm damage with their newb tubes. They're asking for that by mistake, because they've seen the times their build has been effective and noticed that the team stuck together and supported them. Did the team do that due to a deliberate decision to work as a dedicated LRM team? Almost certainly not; they just achieved fire superiority at the start of the match, and the LRMs did the rest. But with random teammates running random builds against similarly random opponents... it's legitimately hard to tell. Murderballs can be coordinated, or not. I guarantee that if you see me in a murderball, I'm calling targets and pointing out flankers and priority threats. But I've been in some that simply ignored me to mindlessly run up Death Valley in Canyon Network, even though I warned them exactly what would happen - they got merked, exactly like Lone Ranger's company got murdered by the Cavendish Gang.

Now, in fact the game does have a mechanic to punish immobility - Light Battlemechs (as well as fast Mediums.) But Lights have the highest skill floor in the game, and the random nature of Quick Play teams makes Lights less attractive to play - particularly when there's two events going on simultaneously and affecting player behaviors.

On another note, tangentially related: you know all the people before this 8v8 test who'd whine on the forums that the game isn't balanced at all and "X thing I don't like is kIlLiNg tHe GAmE?" Those people are now proven idiots, because this right here is what "not balanced at all" looks like. Literally everything - EVERYTHING - is mis-tuned, because it's all balanced for 12v12. And you can definitely tell the difference, right? This is why the matches we get with 8v8 are not the matches we would get if 8v8 were adopted (as it will be, eventually.) But if it wasn't already clear... there's going to be a massive adjustment before we get balance again when that happens.

Edited by Void Angel, 10 August 2025 - 11:57 AM.

[1453 R]

Light 'Mechs can prey on extended and out-of-position assaults, but they can't do anything about a used litterbox clump of six or more assault 'mechs all up in each other's laps pointing guns in basically every direction. That much metal all concentrated in one place is simply immune to raking attacks, and consumable strikes don't deal remotely enough damage to dissuade the clumping. That's why all these people are screaming and screaming and screaming for 12v12 back - they've dropped below Critical Assault mass to make their Murderblobs more-or-less immune to any sort of light cavalry or flanker/stinger/striker attacks so they can simply sit behind their rock and wait for nuclear decay to determine who wins the fight.

I honestly think that's the reason Murderblobbing became the only thing any of them ever do in the first place - they discovered that getting enough assault 'Mechs in a single location made them all collectively immune to the one thing they simply cannot tolerate no matter what - being genuinely outplayed by a light 'Mech and made to pay the natural penalty for their overabundance of weaponry. They're all so hyperfixated on vomiting as much damage as they humanly possibly can, rather than seeking victory in the match, that they play 'mechs that generally lose more than they play 'Mechs that win, so long as they can deal a thousand damage with their lame worthless LRM assaults before getting overrun and killed.

8v8 doesn't usually provide enough metal to do that, but 12v12 does. So players that hate actually being useful to their teams want 12v12 back so they can be pointless damage farmers again rather than trying to learn to be MechWarriors.

[nanashi0110]

1453 R, on 10 August 2025 - 07:29 AM, said:

I've seen a lot of people who're salty and buttmad about 8v8 claim that the lowered team sizes "punish teamplay" by making it more difficult to assemble into a Murderblob, and thus win the game by simply being fatter, thicker, and more dense than the enemy.

Allow me to be clear: the Murderblob is not, never has been, and never will be "Team Play."

Mere physical proximity to allies is not teamwork. Teamwork is defined as coordinating one's efforts with others to improve one's odds of success, and the average Murderblob Enjoyer couldn't spell "coordination" even though I just did and the word is sitting there as an example.

NOTHING about the Murderblob is coordinated. 'Mechs in the Murderblob mostly just get in each other's way, denying each other clean shots at the enemy and preventing anyone in the Murderblob from moving/repositioning to respond to the enemy. it is the Clump of Cowardice, and frankly 12v12 and its emphasis on placing seven-plus assault 'Mechs in a giant largely immobile blorte of metal in the vague middle of the map never should have happened.

The Murderblob only works because the game is not set up correctly. Mobility should matter, actual coordination should matter. The only reason you can get away with being the seventh Bane in the ten-Bane pile-up is because the game does not punish immobility, and lightweight machines cannot appropriately counter you when there's fourteen other Banes next to your miserable worthless 600-tube LRM boat to cover you from the Evil Scary Fast Guy. 100-ton Giga Turrets should be a niche build that requires actual coordination to work, no the de facto default.

If you cannot play this game outside of the Murderblob, then you are not a 'team player'. You are a leech who is using your teammates as nothing but ablative shields in the hopes of getting to be That Guy who does all the damage, gets all the kills, and scores all the Internet chicks through the random happenstance of "the Reds shot at everybody else first."

Hmm... that's a little hard to understand.
So what you're saying is that a lot of people can't focus, and don't know the difference between positioning and lemmings...?
Or...don't understand Lanchester's Laws.

[1453 R]

nanashi0110, on 10 August 2025 - 02:28 PM, said:

Hmm... that's a little hard to understand.
So what you're saying is that a lot of people can't focus, and don't know the difference between positioning and lemmings...?
Or...don't understand Lanchester's Laws.

Short Version:

Most of the people screaming about how 8v8 sucks and they want 12v12 back are assault 'mech "mains" who want to Murderball.

They play assault 'mechs, and they exclusively Murderball, because they are not interested in winning, they are interested in farming damage to generate C-bills.

Murderballing is the most optimal way a group of poor assault 'Mech pilots have of farming damage, because if you get enough large, slow, extremely heavily armed assault 'mechs into a tight enough clump, they lose their weakness to smaller, faster 'Mechs because there's too many assault 'mechs for the faster 'mechs to avoid.

Ergo, the "best" way to deal with a Murderball (unless you can coordinate a firing line and rip it to shreds) is to make a Murderball of your own. Assault 'mech damage farmers love this because it means more total durability on the field to farm for damage/C-bills.

These players believe this counts as "Teamplay" because they are in close proximity to their team, and they believe it's only fair that their team shields them from harm while they score all the damage and get free kills. because 'you should support the assault 'mechs!" is a constant in this forum, so they come to believe that piloting an assault 'mech makes them the Main Character. None of this is actually "Teamplay", but good luck convincing them of that.

This whole cycle is a vicious feedback loop. But 8v8 breaks it because now there's not enough assault 'mechs on a team to let them clump up and be immune to fast 'Mechs anymore, so Murderballing isn't working.

These players don't know how to do anything except Murderball, so they think the entire game is broken because they can't Murderball.

And they're making it everybody else's problem.

Edited by 1453 R, 10 August 2025 - 03:16 PM.

[LordNothing]

this is in the same vein as "nascar is not a strategy". its a product of right hand dominance and heard mentality. it tends to get it going naturally without much in the term of abstract though. if it was a strat you would care where the head is, where the tail is, and where the enemy are. but its generally rotate until you get into weapons range and start trading. it often stalls when the squishy mechs up front run into fat mechs they cant handle and then stall out the rotation and you end up in a static murderball usually in a bad position (the curse of canyon network).

i generally dont like the murder ball much myself, it makes running lights difficult. its easier to land valuable hits from a moving team position. lights can usually work with nascar. assaults arent much better as i can take the slowest bane in my inventory, run at half throttle, get into weapons range, while everyone else is still clustered a grid from spawn. if it were coordinated the other banes would be setting up a kill zone and the lights and meds would be kiting them into it.

[Void Angel]

nanashi0110, on 10 August 2025 - 02:28 PM, said:

Hmm... that's a little hard to understand.
So what you're saying is that a lot of people can't focus, and don't know the difference between positioning and lemmings...?
Or...don't understand Lanchester's Laws.

Oooh, I can't believe I hadn't heard of Lanchester's Laws before - thanks!

[Void Angel]

And Laser - I can disrupt a murderball with my Light. Did it today in a Firemoth on Terra Therma - the enemy team turned around and (eventually) killed me after I ambushed an Arctic Wolf, but in doing so they lost cohesion and got merked by my team. I think I was the only death. Do teams stall out and stop moving, thus giving their members leisure to wonder where the Lights are at? Sure, but it's not inherent - the core of murderball tactics involves all of that metal heading in the same direction, allowing players who are overheating or damaged to fall back and have someone else take their place in direct combat. Sometimes that doesn't happen, but that's because people are Doing It Wrong.

People aren't mad at 12v12 because murderballing isn't effective - the limitations you've pointed out, that no more than a few 'mechs can reasonably occupy any avenue of attack, make that certain. Grouping up and killing people is still the most effective strategy amongst PuGs, because having people all pointing in the same direction is the easiest way to coordinate (and therefore the most reliable.) People are mad about 12v12 because tactics are borked; literally all of the 'mechs and weapons are tuned for 12v12, and people are not adjusting well. So you have random-seeming behaviors from teammates, people insisting on the wrong tactics, and an outsized detriment when a couple of idiots insists on hanging back in Mean Babies to hide behind the team and farm damage. For example. The feedback loop in this game has a lot of shunts and delays already; now everything is off, and people are trying to adjust without realizing that they need to - it feels bad, and that's all it takes to generate all these knee-jerk "I hate this" posts from people who otherwise don't haunt the forums.

[pbiggz]

Void Angel, on 10 August 2025 - 06:25 PM, said:

And Laser - I can disrupt a murderball with my Light. Did it today in a Firemoth on Terra Therma - the enemy team turned around and (eventually) killed me after I ambushed an Arctic Wolf, but in doing so they lost cohesion and got merked by my team. I think I was the only death. Do teams stall out and stop moving, thus giving their members leisure to wonder where the Lights are at? Sure, but it's not inherent - the core of murderball tactics involves all of that metal heading in the same direction, allowing players who are overheating or damaged to fall back and have someone else take their place in direct combat. Sometimes that doesn't happen, but that's because people are Doing It Wrong.

People aren't mad at 12v12 because murderballing isn't effective - the limitations you've pointed out, that no more than a few 'mechs can reasonably occupy any avenue of attack, make that certain. Grouping up and killing people is still the most effective strategy amongst PuGs, because having people all pointing in the same direction is the easiest way to coordinate (and therefore the most reliable.) People are mad about 12v12 because tactics are borked; literally all of the 'mechs and weapons are tuned for 12v12, and people are not adjusting well. So you have random-seeming behaviors from teammates, people insisting on the wrong tactics, and an outsized detriment when a couple of idiots insists on hanging back in Mean Babies to hide behind the team and farm damage. For example. The feedback loop in this game has a lot of shunts and delays already; now everything is off, and people are trying to adjust without realizing that they need to - it feels bad, and that's all it takes to generate all these knee-jerk "I hate this" posts from people who otherwise don't haunt the forums.

This game is balanced for 8v8. Damage values were balanced for it. Armor was balanced for it. Ammo was balanced for it. Its 12v12 that was out of place. People are just used to it.

[Void Angel]

pbiggz, on 11 August 2025 - 10:06 PM, said:

This game is balanced for 8v8. Damage values were balanced for it. Armor was balanced for it. Ammo was balanced for it. Its 12v12 that was out of place. People are just used to it.

Well, no. It WAS balanced for 8v8. It is balanced for 12v12. Case in point is the armor quirks for Atlases. 8v8 without any adjustments feels wrong, like a missing tooth, and it's causing a lot of failure to adapt and angry "I hate this" forum posts - partly because the game is tuned for 12v12, and partly because people don't understand the game well enough to adjust.

Edited by Void Angel, 11 August 2025 - 11:20 PM.

[LordNothing]

so you have to repeal some armor quirks, or better yet dont and keep the lengthened ttk.

[Void Angel]

It's not just the armor quirks, man. And it's only some of the armor quirks, so you can't just leave them. While certain Stone Rhinos, Gargoyles, and a lot of Inner Sphere close-range 'mechs have 20-25 bonus armor on their torsos (the Atlas has 30 and 36,) other 'mechs rely on firepower to survive, and that firepower is tuned toward 12v12.

My Blood Asp has a single +7 armor quirk in one side torso - originally, it had no durability quirks in any component that also contained a weapon mount - and even though it's 90 tons, it goes down fast in a brawl against its weight-class peers. And that's fine, in 12v12. With 8v8, there's less firepower available to put down brawlers as they approach (that firepower was why brawlers have so much extra armor,) so the Blood Asp's interactions with close-range 'mechs can actually be inverted. Rather than controlling mid-range angles with a bunch of autocannons - while the brawler tries to preserve his armor while he gets close - it's the Asp who has to worry about exposing himself too much to shoot at the brawler.

In essence, it's not just durability quirks, or firepower quirks - it's EVERYTHING. Damage per heat, dps per heat, damage per range, burn times, rate of fire... only a few things, like 'mech speeds and rated ballistics' damage numbers, are actually static between 8v8 an 12v12. Everything else has been tuned for balance in a 12v12 environment, and it's not surprising that 8v8 throws everything off. Some of it can be handled by tactical adjustment, but some of it cannot.

[Khosumi]

Void Angel, on 11 August 2025 - 11:18 PM, said:

Well, no. It WAS balanced for 8v8. It is balanced for 12v12. Case in point is the armor quirks for Atlases. 8v8 without any adjustments feels wrong, like a missing tooth, and it's causing a lot of failure to adapt and angry "I hate this" forum posts - partly because the game is tuned for 12v12, and partly because people don't understand the game well enough to adjust.

By and large, the biggest reason why people hate 8v8 is because it completely ruins the deathballing meta. It immediately highlights bad players, the ones who never bothered learning maps because it was just so much easier to wander around as a blob and letting everything else happen instead of taking an active role in helping the team.

[Void Angel]

Eh, that's an anecdotal opinion that's hard to support. I've seen a lot of people, particularly early on, get the team killed because they run off too much to do their own thing. But I've also seen people deathballing around... because it's still effective. It's actually more effective, because you still only fit the same number of people through many of the choke points, but there are fewer 'mechs on the other side to hold that point - and each one of them that dies from the deathball takes more of the team's firepower with them.

I think that some of people's frustration is with the random-seeming nature of player behaviors. It's a "new" format in the middle of an event, after all, both of which will encourage people to innovate - or just act weird because they feel the strangeness. It's also easier to branch out and be "clever" with fewer people to punish you for bad positioning. People are going to be annoyed with 8v8 for a variety of reasons, but it simply can't just be that deathball tactics don't work - because they're still working today. Just had a match where the enemy team rotated to our base and camped on it to force us into their firing line. They had multiple assaults, and arguably superior position, but we coordinated our fire and pushed into the the spawn area - and the deathball still won.

[Khosumi]

Void Angel, on 12 August 2025 - 01:03 PM, said:

Eh, that's an anecdotal opinion that's hard to support. I've seen a lot of people, particularly early on, get the team killed because they run off too much to do their own thing. But I've also seen people deathballing around... because it's still effective. It's actually more effective, because you still only fit the same number of people through many of the choke points, but there are fewer 'mechs on the other side to hold that point - and each one of them that dies from the deathball takes more of the team's firepower with them.

I think that some of people's frustration is with the random-seeming nature of player behaviors. It's a "new" format in the middle of an event, after all, both of which will encourage people to innovate - or just act weird because they feel the strangeness. It's also easier to branch out and be "clever" with fewer people to punish you for bad positioning. People are going to be annoyed with 8v8 for a variety of reasons, but it simply can't just be that deathball tactics don't work - because they're still working today. Just had a match where the enemy team rotated to our base and camped on it to force us into their firing line. They had multiple assaults, and arguably superior position, but we coordinated our fire and pushed into the the spawn area - and the deathball still won.

There is not much of an advantage if you can fit the same amount of mechs physically through an opening, and likewise the same amount of people that you have can take defensive positions just the same. In raw firepower, it is not better for anyone. It has scaled down for both sides.
Beating out a camp is not very a big achievement. Literally anything else will win against it, short of feeding 1 by 1.

Any time you think a deathball can work, most other methods which includes flanking will also be able to do it more effectively.

[pbiggz]

Void Angel, on 12 August 2025 - 09:04 AM, said:

It's not just the armor quirks, man. And it's only some of the armor quirks, so you can't just leave them. While certain Stone Rhinos, Gargoyles, and a lot of Inner Sphere close-range 'mechs have 20-25 bonus armor on their torsos (the Atlas has 30 and 36,) other 'mechs rely on firepower to survive, and that firepower is tuned toward 12v12.

My Blood Asp has a single +7 armor quirk in one side torso - originally, it had no durability quirks in any component that also contained a weapon mount - and even though it's 90 tons, it goes down fast in a brawl against its weight-class peers. And that's fine, in 12v12. With 8v8, there's less firepower available to put down brawlers as they approach (that firepower was why brawlers have so much extra armor,) so the Blood Asp's interactions with close-range 'mechs can actually be inverted. Rather than controlling mid-range angles with a bunch of autocannons - while the brawler tries to preserve his armor while he gets close - it's the Asp who has to worry about exposing himself too much to shoot at the brawler.

In essence, it's not just durability quirks, or firepower quirks - it's EVERYTHING. Damage per heat, dps per heat, damage per range, burn times, rate of fire... only a few things, like 'mech speeds and rated ballistics' damage numbers, are actually static between 8v8 an 12v12. Everything else has been tuned for balance in a 12v12 environment, and it's not surprising that 8v8 throws everything off. Some of it can be handled by tactical adjustment, but some of it cannot.

I think you're thinking too hard.

[Void Angel]

Nope - I'm just analyzing - and I'm right.

Khosumi, on 12 August 2025 - 01:11 PM, said:

There is not much of an advantage if you can fit the same amount of mechs physically through an opening, and likewise the same amount of people that you have can take defensive positions just the same. In raw firepower, it is not better for anyone. It has scaled down for both sides.
Beating out a camp is not very a big achievement. Literally anything else will win against it, short of feeding 1 by 1.

Any time you think a deathball can work, most other methods which includes flanking will also be able to do it more effectively.

Not true; the spaces beyond choke points always have more space available, allowing more teammates to defend a choke than can fit through it. That has an effect.

For camping, you're just incorrect. The whole point of a base camp is that it forces you to hard-engage and inflicts a timer. You don't have time to flank or get creative, and the deathball still works. That's why it's used: it works. And, that's why it will continue to be used in 8v8, which was the point of my illustration.

[Khosumi]

Void Angel, on 12 August 2025 - 02:29 PM, said:

Nope - I'm just analyzing - and I'm right.



Not true; the spaces beyond choke points always have more space available, allowing more teammates to defend a choke than can fit through it. That has an effect.

For camping, you're just incorrect. The whole point of a base camp is that it forces you to hard-engage and inflicts a timer. You don't have time to flank or get creative, and the deathball still works. That's why it's used: it works. And, that's why it will continue to be used in 8v8, which was the point of my illustration.

Honestly using bad gameplay as an argument is not within my interests so excuse me while I don't care about this.

Quite frankly you have 2 guides, that you wrote yourself, which inherently promotes the behavior of deathballing at all costs. You never nuance anything, it's always stick together as a pack.
I truthfully cannot take what you say seriously.

Edited by Khosumi, 12 August 2025 - 02:39 PM.

[Void Angel]

You most definitely do care, or you wouldn't have bothered with addressing it - do you imagine that affecting an air of superior indifference makes your bad arguments more palatable? You can't have it both ways, no matter how much you want to have your cake and eat it, too. Your inability to read my guides and understand them doesn't do you any favors, either. Even a fool is thought wise if they keep silent, but you just can't bring yourself to do it.

I don't need to be taken seriously by you - you're unwilling to understand the game, and your only interest in my contributions is to skim them for talking points to shoehorn into an attempt to hand-wave my arguments away. Come back when you're willing to engage honestly with ideas that don't fit your pet peeves and blinkered point of view.

[Khosumi]

Void Angel, on 12 August 2025 - 02:47 PM, said:

You most definitely do care, or you wouldn't have bothered with addressing it - do you imagine that affecting an air of superior indifference makes your bad arguments more palatable? You can't have it both ways, no matter how much you want to have your cake and eat it, too. Your inability to read my guides and understand them doesn't do you any favors, either. Even a fool is thought wise if they keep silent, but you just can't bring yourself to do it.

I don't need to be taken seriously by you - you're unwilling to understand the game, and your only interest in my contributions is to skim them for talking points to shoehorn into an attempt to hand-wave my arguments away. Come back when you're willing to engage honestly with ideas that don't fit your pet peeves and blinkered point of view.

I hope you see the irony in trying to do the very same thing you accuse me of by saying I don't understand the game.