161 replies to this topic

[Hennessey]

I'm not posting this as a question. The idea here is simply to get the ball rolling on ideas of what people would like to see if PVE were ever implemented (especially those more intimate with the canon than I am)!

This post officially breaks my Forum cherry for any game I've ever played . This however, is a topic that I feel deserves a lot of discussion as it seems to me that this will be the difference between a fast paced shooter with quirky (and endearing) mechanics, or an MMO that truly brings something new to the online community. That being said here is why I believe PVE, if done correctly, would make this the game we all want it to be (even the hardcore PVPers):

When I started playing Mechwarrior, oh let's see... about 17 years ago (has it been that long?), the PVP option was mind-blowing to say the least, but only because I had earned the right to be there. I had battled odds of 1:10 and come out on top. I had figured out the best methods for exacting precision kills against fierce (albeit by today's standards 'stupid') AI Mechs. I then defeated their leader at the end of the campaign in a Mech that towered over me and could melt me in one blast.

And for all of this preparation, I entered PVP and got my proverbial handed to me.

After a while it stopped being fun to PVP, and I was forced back into campaign to try to perfect the lessons I had been embarrassed with in PVP. Things like Alpha strikes that didn't cause me to overheat every single time. Things like Jump Jetting and putting a boot on someone's nose .

Things that I had never needed to use in campaign, but would never have a chance to test out in PVP as I was getting obliterated, and no one was willing to help me learn.

Enough nostalgia. My point is by adding an engaging PVE feature to the game, those lulls in between epic clan clashes (that will eventually only take place on Friday night after everyone is home from work), will be filled by you and couple of friends, a hundred of your clan mates, or even a PUG, fighting your way through some random planet only to come up on a GINOURMOUS SPIDER-MECH TOUTING 10 MECHS WORTH OF FIREPOWER, AND NEVER SEEN BEFORE ANYWHERE BY ANYONE IN THE GALAXY ('cept the last time you did it of course ). Then comes the satisfaction that I was pining for the whole time I was getting smashed in PVP: taking that **** down in a collaborated group effort and rejoicing in the spoils as the Boss explodes like a CBill pinata .

Then what really matters in community games like this starts happening:

Later, when you go back to base and add that guy to your friends list who ran in front of you and took a PPC blast for you because he knew it was his duty as an assault Mech. Or the other guy/girl/w/e who orchestrated the main assault by rearing back the Cata's to stay just distant enough to fire off LRMs while the brawlers went in to pound ground.

I'm sure some people (let's be real.... the one person who actually read this far) is asking themselves: "How is this any different than PVP? Er, besides the giant spider thing of course..."

The simple answer is: No fear of defeat.

I'm not saying that a PVE system should be without costs. And, I'm definately not saying that it should be worth so much as to feel mandatory. What I am saying is that there are a lot of people out there who simply won't play a PVP only game because they don't want to feel guilty when they read posts from some brat 12 year old who racks in 6 hours a day EVERY DAY after school, and feels inclined to tell you what a "eFFIn' FAT WERTHLUSS newb L2P POS" you are simply because your clan lost a territory/match/couple bucks

And yes, that will still happen, but if the rewards/loss isn't so great in PVE, then it will happen less.

So, if you're still with me... What does PVE do for PVP?

Keeps it alive for one.

There will come a time, when you/your friends/your clan just aren't having fun fighting the same people week in week out (winning or losing), because one of them has beef with you about a ridiculously long post you made about PVE a while back... This can be a breaking point for a game if there are no alternatives. Not to say that the PVP is weak!!! Hell, I love what they've done so far, and feel it was worth every penny (already) spent just to get a glimpse. However, I don't want this particular franchise to be an 'almost' simply because people are afraid PVP will suffer if PVE is added.

Secondly PVE can be a way for PVPs to hone their skills, come up with new tactics, try out new cadets/builds/CATCH PHRASES! And they can do it all with the comfort of knowing that nobody but them was there to see the SPIDERNATEROVER-9000 decimate their entire clan (difficulty scaling with number of people is a must for a setup like this, so that 1 person can do it or 100), and in the end they thanked him; Simply because he showed them that having an entire team of Jenners simply was not going to cut it .

TLDR; I have played other MMO's and I know there are people who would live entirely in PVP. There are just as many who would live entirely in PVE. I think we should be very supportive of that If we're going to make this game as good as it possibly can be, because once it comes down to it, the people that really love this game like I do, are going to do both, and I think we're the majority.

Edited by Hennessey, 17 August 2012 - 10:46 PM.

[Saivost Rast]

Well said good sir. I to would love to see some sort of PvP implemented in the near future.

[Hennessey]

Saivost Rast, on 17 August 2012 - 08:30 PM, said:

Well said good sir. I to would love to see some sort of PvP implemented in the near future.

LOL I hope you meant to type PVE and you're not just trolling me

[Greyrook]

I drink you, hennessy, I drink you.

Sounds like a decent point, but I doubt any giant enemy crabs can be implemented for a while.

[JFlash49]

i like this idea. PvP gets boring sometimes.

[Epitaph]

I agree some sort of PVE should be implemented. Even if its not specifically a PVE game mode, but just like adding AI non-mech vehicles to matches for a bit of variety.

I'm also a firm believer the Clans should be PVE at first, opening to players after some time.

[Team Leader]

Giant spider mech never seen by anyone else in the galaxy eh? Reminds me of the good old days in mech assault 2 haha just kidding. Yea I would really love to see some PvE later on after community warfare is put in fully. While other games can get away with strictly PvP (tribes, team fortress, etc) MechWarrior just doesn't roll that way. The finer parts of the games were the sprawling campaigns!

[Denin]

Nicely thought post. Even if no pve ever makes it into this game, if MWO makes enough money someone will create another story based Mechwarrior game.

[cinco]

Denin, on 17 August 2012 - 09:07 PM, said:

Nicely thought post. Even if no pve ever makes it into this game, if MWO makes enough money someone will create another story based Mechwarrior game.

which will probably be garbage. i'd rather no pvp than terrible game with pve.

[Oxford]

Well you could have missions in the area around the FRR where a group of co-op players try to hold back the clan advance.
Maybe that would shut the Mad Cat fans up too.

[Hennessey]

Epitaph, on 17 August 2012 - 08:54 PM, said:

[...]
I'm also a firm believer the Clans should be PVE at first, opening to players after some time.

Oxford, on 17 August 2012 - 10:53 PM, said:

Well you could have missions in the area around the FRR where a group of co-op players try to hold back the clan advance.
[...]

These points have been bouncing around in my head as well. Give casual gamers, and small groups something to do that really feels epic and gives a decent reward. Especially if the big clans become "untouchable" simply because of sheer numbers. Maybe even a campaign to take over the clan initially... rather than insta-clan chowder.... wow... that was bad even for me.

[Angelkiller777]

Well in one of he dev interviews they said they tried out PVE first, so that would imply that they have AI scripts for the mechs sitting around somewhere.
Now I would love to see the clans introduced as PVE opponents first. Trying to defend IS territory from their assaults would be a lot of fun.
Or even to have them randomly hot drop into PVP games...

Clan drop ship streaks over head...
The opposing team suddenly reads as friendlies on your IFF...
<Mech power up detected>...
Timber Wolf splashes down 300M from you...

Both teams get XP based on how long they can survive.

[Hennessey]

^^^ This is what I am talking about! Keep it coming!

[xBlaqkDeathx]

Angelkiller777, on 17 August 2012 - 11:48 PM, said:

Well in one of he dev interviews they said they tried out PVE first, so that would imply that they have AI scripts for the mechs sitting around somewhere.
Now I would love to see the clans introduced as PVE opponents first. Trying to defend IS territory from their assaults would be a lot of fun.
Or even to have them randomly hot drop into PVP games...

Clan drop ship streaks over head...
The opposing team suddenly reads as friendlies on your IFF...
<Mech power up detected>...
Timber Wolf splashes down 300M from you...

Both teams get XP based on how long they can survive.

That sounds pretty cool actually.

[Hennessey]

Angelkiller777, on 17 August 2012 - 11:48 PM, said:

[...]
Now I would love to see the clans introduced as PVE opponents first. Trying to defend IS territory from their assaults would be a lot of fun.
Or even to have them randomly hot drop into PVP games...

Clan drop ship streaks over head...
The opposing team suddenly reads as friendlies on your IFF...
<Mech power up detected>...
Timber Wolf splashes down 300M from you...

Both teams get XP based on how long they can survive.

Could even take it a step futher, and if you beat them, their Base is open for attack/conquering by those involved, and then to the victor goes the spoils Last man/group standing style?

[Willpower]

Those ideas sound pretty good, actually.

However, I'd like to see that kind of thing as an alternate play-mode as well. So I can hop in with 3 of my buddies and go knock about some AI mechs, or defend a position from some set number of waves of AI mechs.

Having random clan drops, though, that sounds pretty darn cool.

[BrokenGlytch]

It's worth pointing out that the easiest way to get PvE is the 'best' way to get PvE, at least in terms of programming and development requirement. To that end, while I agree with basically everything in this post and think (as a MechWarrior player since the original MW2) that it would be fantastic to have complex scripted or semi-scripted PvE again in a Mech game that didn't blow, we should start small and see if it catches on.

That said, I want to see the initial PvE work just like the co-op mode in MechWarrior 3's arsenal. For those unfamiliar or in need of a refresher; the player or players (up to a lance of 4 if I recall) selected their mechs and their specific variants, then spawned at a predetermined location in the map. AI Waves would spawn in outside of a minimum range and their sole objective was the annihilation of every player mech. Waves generally started 'easy' with just a couple light mechs, and the last wave was mixed with heavies, assaults, and a gnat or two since you had bigger fish to fry. I seem to remember being able to manually configure them for fitting testing / custom challenges as well, but it's been many years since I had a computer that could run MW3 stable. It just didn't make the transition to Vista/7 well.

TL;DR - To make PvE easy to implement, it should be 1-8 (4 optimal) players vs scalable waves that get progressively tougher with the sole objective of approaching players and killing them, perhaps optionally with manually configurable waves for custom matches and semi-randomized waves normally. Realistically you could even do endless waves and rank teams by how long they survive / how little damage they take in a time limit / how much damage they inflict in a time limit or before everyone dies, etc. to make PvE competitive as well.

Edited by BrokenGlytch, 18 August 2012 - 12:38 AM.

[c19]

Hennessey, on 17 August 2012 - 08:21 PM, said:

I'm not posting this as a question. The idea here is simply to get the ball rolling on ideas of what people would like to see if PVE were ever implemented (especially those more intimate with the canon than I am)!

This post officially breaks my Forum cherry for any game I've ever played . This however, is a topic that I feel deserves a lot of discussion as it seems to me that this will be the difference between a fast paced shooter with quirky (and endearing) mechanics, or an MMO that truly brings something new to the online community. That being said here is why I believe PVE, if done correctly, would make this the game we all want it to be (even the hardcore PVPers):

When I started playing Mechwarrior, oh let's see... about 17 years ago (has it been that long?), the PVP option was mind-blowing to say the least, but only because I had earned the right to be there. I had battled odds of 1:10 and come out on top. I had figured out the best methods for exacting precision kills against fierce (albeit by today's standards 'stupid') AI Mechs. I then defeated their leader at the end of the campaign in a Mech that towered over me and could melt me in one blast.

And for all of this preparation, I entered PVP and got my proverbial handed to me.

After a while it stopped being fun to PVP, and I was forced back into campaign to try to perfect the lessons I had been embarrassed with in PVP. Things like Alpha strikes that didn't cause me to overheat every single time. Things like Jump Jetting and putting a boot on someone's nose .

Things that I had never needed to use in campaign, but would never have a chance to test out in PVP as I was getting obliterated, and no one was willing to help me learn.

Enough nostalgia. My point is by adding an engaging PVE feature to the game, those lulls in between epic clan clashes (that will eventually only take place on Friday night after everyone is home from work), will be filled by you and couple of friends, a hundred of your clan mates, or even a PUG, fighting your way through some random planet only to come up on a GINOURMOUS SPIDER-MECH TOUTING 10 MECHS WORTH OF FIREPOWER, AND NEVER SEEN BEFORE ANYWHERE BY ANYONE IN THE GALAXY ('cept the last time you did it of course ). Then comes the satisfaction that I was pining for the whole time I was getting smashed in PVP: taking that **** down in a collaborated group effort and rejoicing in the spoils as the Boss explodes like a CBill pinata .

Then what really matters in community games like this starts happening:

Later, when you go back to base and add that guy to your friends list who ran in front of you and took a PPC blast for you because he knew it was his duty as an assault Mech. Or the other guy/girl/w/e who orchestrated the main assault by rearing back the Cata's to stay just distant enough to fire off LRMs while the brawlers went in to pound ground.

I'm sure some people (let's be real.... the one person who actually read this far) is asking themselves: "How is this any different than PVP? Er, besides the giant spider thing of course..."

The simple answer is: No fear of defeat.

I'm not saying that a PVE system should be without costs. And, I'm definately not saying that it should be worth so much as to feel mandatory. What I am saying is that there are a lot of people out there who simply won't play a PVP only game because they don't want to feel guilty when they read posts from some brat 12 year old who racks in 6 hours a day EVERY DAY after school, and feels inclined to tell you what a "eFFIn' FAT WERTHLUSS newb L2P POS" you are simply because your clan lost a territory/match/couple bucks

And yes, that will still happen, but if the rewards/loss isn't so great in PVE, then it will happen less.

So, if you're still with me... What does PVE do for PVP?

Keeps it alive for one.

There will come a time, when you/your friends/your clan just aren't having fun fighting the same people week in week out (winning or losing), because one of them has beef with you about a ridiculously long post you made about PVE a while back... This can be a breaking point for a game if there are no alternatives. Not to say that the PVP is weak!!! Hell, I love what they've done so far, and feel it was worth every penny (already) spent just to get a glimpse. However, I don't want this particular franchise to be an 'almost' simply because people are afraid PVP will suffer if PVE is added.

Secondly PVE can be a way for PVPs to hone their skills, come up with new tactics, try out new cadets/builds/CATCH PHRASES! And they can do it all with the comfort of knowing that nobody but them was there to see the SPIDERNATEROVER-9000 decimate their entire clan (difficulty scaling with number of people is a must for a setup like this, so that 1 person can do it or 100), and in the end they thanked him; Simply because he showed them that having an entire team of Jenners simply was not going to cut it .

TLDR; I have played other MMO's and I know there are people who would live entirely in PVP. There are just as many who would live entirely in PVE. I think we should be very supportive of that If we're going to make this game as good as it possibly can be, because once it comes down to it, the people that really love this game like I do, are going to do both, and I think we're the majority.

Agreed.
Battletechs storyline is what makes battletech and mechwarrior. Thats why i do not foresee myself playing this game for very long unless story content is introduced via PVE. I played Mechwarrior 2 mercs and mechwarrior 4 mercenaries for years (went back and played again and picked up some more books as well recently), while only playing multiplayer maybe once or twice, which it seems mechwarrior 4 multiplayer is essentially this MMO.

[Herbert Daring Dashwood]

Angelkiller777, on 17 August 2012 - 11:48 PM, said:

Well in one of he dev interviews they said they tried out PVE first, so that would imply that they have AI scripts for the mechs sitting around somewhere.
Now I would love to see the clans introduced as PVE opponents first. Trying to defend IS territory from their assaults would be a lot of fun.
Or even to have them randomly hot drop into PVP games...

Clan drop ship streaks over head...
The opposing team suddenly reads as friendlies on your IFF...
<Mech power up detected>...
Timber Wolf splashes down 300M from you...

Both teams get XP based on how long they can survive.

This. This.

Oh My god, think, a year or so from now they host a tournament, in the final match as the two greatest mech-Corps/Houses are slinging it out, being watched by thousands, hundereds of clan Mechs rain from the skies, controlled by AI's. That would be amazing, then they could introduce "Defence" where two lances of Mechs hold off waves of Clan Mechs.


Someone needs to show this to the devs. twice.

[Maethos]

PVE could start out as a ingame training sim for new pilot, difficulty scales to mech lvl(i.e. new pilot, basic.elite & master) in order to attain next lvl in a mech. Could also maybe add pve to pvp matches with the commander calling in reinforcements (as a command module?).

all in all some form of pve would be great, not just to make the game better but to also appeal to more people.