9 replies to this topic

[Longtom]

Make planets.

Make moving your forces to those planets for an assault become costly.

Make some kind of industry and trading for resources and technology like in EVE Online.

Make Jumpships for long range strikes.

Make Jumpships expensive so that leaders need to think long and hard about attacking someone.

Make dropships for short range traveling

Make dropships cheaper.

Make dropships attackable.

Make that how you enter the map to begin combat for the attackers.

Make repairs count against the Clan/Squad/Merc's pocketbook

Make it so we can salvage our fallen foe's equipment.

Piranah, if you did this right, an AeroTech addon in the future to enhance the thrill of getting your Jumpship into position while the commander sweats it out would only be a stone's throw away.

You can simply make the Dropship/Jumpship the "base" and if the light craft can defeat the others, they "win" the match and the dropship is "destroyed."

Make the AeroTech based battle possibly prevent the Jumpship from assaulting the planet.

While Mechs are pouring out of the dropship (respawn), if the aerotech fighters can win their fight in the air, reinforcements for the assaulting team will be cut off (or something like that).

Think: World of Tanks and their new product, World of Warplanes. However, World of Tanks is doing it WRONG. The two products will not be integrated and hold no sway on each other (plus their maps suck).

Edited by Longtom, 26 January 2012 - 10:30 PM.

[FACEman Peck]

Did you spend all day working on this? It's kinda funny to me...

[Kaemon]

Longtom, on 26 January 2012 - 10:23 PM, said:

Make planets.

Make moving your forces to those planets for an assault become costly.

Make some kind of industry and trading for resources and technology like in EVE Online.

Make Jumpships for long range strikes.

Make Jumpships expensive so that leaders need to think long and hard about attacking someone.

Make dropships for short range traveling

Make dropships cheaper.

Make dropships attackable.

Make that how you enter the map to begin combat for the attackers.

Make repairs count against the Clan/Squad/Merc's pocketbook

Make it so we can salvage our fallen foe's equipment.

Piranah, if you did this right, an AeroTech addon in the future to enhance the thrill of getting your Jumpship into position while the commander sweats it out would only be a stone's throw away.

You can simply make the Dropship/Jumpship the "base" and if the light craft can defeat the others, they "win" the match and the dropship is "destroyed."

Make the AeroTech based battle possibly prevent the Jumpship from assaulting the planet.

While Mechs are pouring out of the dropship (respawn), if the aerotech fighters can win their fight in the air, reinforcements for the assaulting team will be cut off (or something like that).

Think: World of Tanks and their new product, World of Warplanes. However, World of Tanks is doing it WRONG. The two products will not be integrated and hold no sway on each other (plus their maps suck).

Actually WoT is talking about intergrating them: http://www.armchairg...f-warplanes.htm

The rest of this I'll leave alone.

[Rabbit Blacksun]

I ... dont even know where to begin ...

[Agent CraZy DiP]

Rabbit Blacksun, on 27 January 2012 - 12:23 AM, said:

I ... dont even know where to begin ...

ditto

[FinnMcKool]

Make , I want to be able to buy a dropship and then sell my services to others , ??

why cant i pilot it , control the weapon systems , make money and friends???

I can see it now , and your designated driver is the always sober Finn "Hop a ride with McKools cattle raiders.... free steak meals for the ride home !


Dont forget its a cruel universe out there, only ride with those you trust.

[Quincy McAllister]

Community Warfare: Jump ships, Drop ships, Aerospace Fighters, Economics, Repair & Rearm

With the introduction of community warfare certain strategic elements may become important to the game. Some thoughts on these elements are summarized below.

Jump ships
Jump ships are needed for interstellar transport. A flexible jump ship fleet is an asset that allows for strategic interstellar mobility. I see several levels of jump ship availability: 1. made available (by house transport command), 2. Rented (from jump ship operators / merchants); 3. Owned. The different levels may see improving benefits, i.e. faster interstellar transport (more attacks, long distance strikes, ability to bringing reinforcements) with the ultimate tool being a very fast “pony express” jump ship system or the use of pirate points (surprise, strategic reserve of “hidden troops” (behind the far side of a moon) in a planetary attack).

Drop ships
Drop ships offer strategic mobility on a planetary scale. Drop ships can give the benefit of determining the battle zone (choice of map) depending on the mission type. They allow for a strategic surprise in connection with a jump ship using a pirate point. And they allow bringing reinforcements to the troops on the ground.

Aerospace fighters
Aerospace fighters might be able to establish space superiority together with drop ships. If space superiority is achieved a regular drop may be a potential benefit. In a regular drop a landing zone is secured and drop ships can actually land that carry certain auxiliary troops (tanks, infantry, support units, etc.). Otherwise if space superiority is not achieved only a combat drop can be made. In a combat drop only mechs could be used. As a consequence in a regular drop repair and rearm would be possible whereas in a combat drop repair & rearm would not be possible (as support troops could not be landed).
In addition aerospace fighters may be able to establish air superiority over a certain battlefield. A potential benefit of air superiority may be the ability to do strafing runs or to deny repair and rearm possibilities to the enemy (by harassing supply routes).

Drop ships and Aerospace Fighters may be available on a C-Bill basis but especially jump ships (with the very limited production facilities left in the inner sphere) should also require a certain prestige in order to be allowed to purchase such a ship.

Some strategic benefits on the supply side
Mercenaries may be able to purchase supplies from their employer. However Mercenaries doing so should have some vulnerability to the “company store syndrome”, i.e. that employer overcharge for supplies and try to run the mercenary unit into a debt. Upgrades to this could be independent house sourcing, or independent cross-house sourcing (which would however need some jump ship / merchant drop ship availability). With each step supply costs should be lower and the mercenary unit will get further away from a possible “company store syndrome”.

Shares in weapon producing companies
Mercenary units could own shares in certain weapon and or equipment producing companies earning them revenue and lower prices for goods produced by these companies. Shares could also give a benefit in reduced repair & rearm costs. Shares of mech producing companies may depend on the popularity of certain mech models in the game.

How to implement “Surprise”
Allow the party that achieves strategic surprise to move certain seconds earlier in an engagement and position them better, or to allow them to choose a spawn point.

How to implement “Strategic reserve”
Allow the party that is able to place a “strategic reserve” to add a number of mechs at the spawn point after battle has commenced.

Repair and Rearm
Repair and Rearm has definitely to find its way back into the game with community warfare. An amateur general thinks tactics, a professional general thinks logistics. A lot of military success depends on the ability to properly supply own forces and to deny supplies to enemy forces.

Benefits of special units
Special auxiliary units may be potential benefits that can be obtained. In a regular drop where these units can be brought to battle they could have the following effects.
Coolant trucks: Better heat dissipation
Repair facility: Allow repairs to varying degrees of damage (a small facility may only repair armor, whereas the high end repair facility may also be used to repair fusion engine hits). Logical consequences are different repair times for light and sever damage. Again this may be interesting in a sustained campaign, when the ability of a party to bring fresh troops into follow up battles may be decisive.
Ammunition truck: Ability to rearm
MASH: Ability to care for injured pilots. As a consequence a new status “injured” would be needed for mechs / pilots that suffered a cockpit hit.
Mobile HQ: Could have many possible advantages, e.g. the ability to relocate forces between different combat zones, advanced information warfare capabilities, etc.

Advanced economics
Instead of paying mercenary units on a C-Bill basis they could be paid on a House Bill basis (K-Bills, L-Bills, etc.) The value of the house currencies could depend on economic strength which itself would depend on some military successes (e.g. successfully defending valuable planets / production facilities). Thereby the economic success of a mercenary unit would also be indirectly tied to overall House success and not only its individual performance. This will include another element than just House prestige to the game.
The ownership of certain production facilities could have an impact on unit / equipment prices, e.g. a “Zeus” could be cheaper on the Lyran Commonwealth part of the Federated Commonwealth. The ownership of certain important planets / production facilities could also have an influence on repair and rearm costs. Maintaining a “Zeus” in Liao space is probably more expensive.

Difference between house and mercenary units
Obviously money is more important to mercenary units than to house units. However both rely on a certain prestige. Much of the monetary issues could also be implemented for house units (e.g. through a regimental budget) but the ability to get certain benefits may also be achieved in a different way by mercenary units (mainly money) and house units (mainly prestige).

Benefits of multiple mechs
Players with several personal mechs should have a certain benefit in a sustained community warfare campaign. They could be allowed to take part in multiple campaigns at the same time. They could be allowed to bring in fresh troops, if one of their other mechs is still in repair & rearm or its pilot is injured.

Sorry for the long post. However I hope you find some value in the ideas.

[General Taskeen]

Let's pray Community Warfare is that immersive.

[Oppresor]

Its a dream, apart from the Respawn idea. But dreams sometimes develop into reality. It's definitely a long way off and may never happen in MWO as it is now, but there are some great ideas in there. I was looking at the MechWarrior Mercenaries Field Reference earlier today and realised that that had been spread across a number of worlds; so we can only hope.

[shotokan5]

It is what ideas that the same people of 3025 had before ea. pulled the plug. they were even going to throw in a bar on the drop ship.