589 replies to this topic

[Shadowstarr]

From a related topic about eliminating 3rd party voip. http://mwomercs.com/...post__p__158935

I posted this and feel it applies to the use in infomation warfare effecting team communications:

"Best case situation (aka not fraggin' likely) A comparable system of in-game VoIP chat, is there along with the ability to listen in at various levels and all is put in as the original poster suggested . The community doesn't mind whatever means the game enforces folks not to cheat to bypass. Lets just say all these thing happen and the system works flawlessly. Within days any serious team/clan whatever will be talking in code thereby making all the effort kinda pointless. IMO the risk / reward isn't there for this kinda feature.

Sides its not all that BT canon I doubt the average mechwarrior would be linguistically diverse enough to really make much use of enemy coms in a battlefield situation.

-SS

[pursang]

Bryan Ekman, on 05 April 2012 - 09:58 AM, said:

We have contextual command/order menus that all players can use. So that should go a long way to solving the OPs needs (I hope).

If they're anything like the ones used by Tribes, then that would be excellent indeed.

[Bryan Ekman]

pursang, on 05 April 2012 - 10:03 AM, said:

If they're anything like the ones used by Tribes, then that would be excellent indeed.

I'll take a looksie.

[StompyMcGee]

pursang, on 05 April 2012 - 10:03 AM, said:

If they're anything like the ones used by Tribes, then that would be excellent indeed.

It leaves your voice comms free for the witty one-liners as you cook up an enemy mech("guess he's a bit hot under the collar").

[Max Power]

What's the expected age group for this game? If it's more mature players, then I would say that VOIP would be good. If the expected player base is younger, then I don't want VOIP so much.

I've always felt that this is what determines if in game VOIP is good/useful.

[Bryan Ekman]

Mr. Smiles, on 05 April 2012 - 09:59 AM, said:

The two big differences though, which I don't think are to be written off, are a ) as far as I can tell from my big State of the Sphere survey, the average age of a MWO community member is older. Probably because BattleTech is a much older IP.

This is true now, since early adopters tend to be fans, and older. Our demographics actually skews evenly from 18-54, each segment representing about 20% and will skew younger as we go through beta and launch.

That aside, your OP is definitely valid and falls into a grey zone. The core users will most likely use their own solution, the casual users will most likely use none. However a tight knit small group as you have mentioned, is left out in the cold. I wish I had a solution in place that filled this middle ground. Know that it is on our radar.

[syngyne]

pursang, on 05 April 2012 - 10:03 AM, said:

If they're anything like the ones used by Tribes, then that would be excellent indeed.

Or Battlefield, for that matter. The commo rose worked really well.

[Nexus Trimean]

Bryan Ekman, on 05 April 2012 - 09:51 AM, said:

In short, my personal assessment of VOIP is those players that actually use it, and use it well, are well organized and prefer to have their own setup. People playing casual matches generally don't use VOIP.

This is a Great Summation, If you are the kind of person who uses VOIP effectively, you already have a preferred VOIP Solution to use with your mates. I would prefer the Dev time went to more important features.

Bryan Ekman, on 05 April 2012 - 10:11 AM, said:

That aside, your OP is definitely valid and falls into a grey zone. The core users will most likely use their own solution, the casual users will most likely use none. However a tight knit small group as you have mentioned, is left out in the cold. I wish I had a solution in place that filled this middle ground. Know that it is on our radar.

Skype fills this nicely, there are a few LoL and HoN teams that use skype, its great for 4-5 people communications.

Edited by Nexus Trimean, 05 April 2012 - 10:26 AM.

[Shredhead]

As a long time Project Reality player I really recommend their ingame VOIP solution. The game is based on squads, the normal footslogger only has access to intersquad comms, while the squadleader is able to communicate with the commander too. Now I really can't say if PR devs made it, or if it originates from BF2, but this would be the solution, as it massively encourages teamplay. Link: http://www.realitymod.com/

[wwiiogre]

I would have loved voip in game the way it was originally envisioned by the dev's with jamming and listening in. Unfortunately like they noted some will use TS/Vent etc. so it just seems like a waste of dev time. I agree with this. I also agree that most pub players that are casual will not use it anyway. I will be using it with my merc group and trust me we are already working on our comm protocols and will insist all use it if possible.

chris

[Nexus Trimean]

Just did a little checking and you can get a 10 slot mumble server for less than 2 dollars a month. Any group should be able to scrape that together, as an independant solution, and mumble is better than ventrillo in my experiance, as far as quality and speed go.

[Eximar]

I'm happy they aren't wasting their time and resources on VOIP. Means the game will be better, sooner.

As was said before, any player that doesn't use Vent/TS is too casual to use VOIP anyway.

[Threat Doc]

Okay, I'm not reading all of this. Paul, there are ways to shut down, or fail to allow the use of third-party VOIP programs; however, I don't even think that should be an issue. Put in the VOIP, anyway, allow those of us who want to use it to do so; if you did, I have ZERO intent to use any other program, anyway, as I want to hear the commo beeps, the static when missiles and PPCs fly past me, the lower volume when I actually take a hit, and having the radio cut out because I don't have a decent air connect to the 'Mechs around me, lack of LOS. I WANT those things.

As for not being able to transfer money, Merc Corps should be able to transfer money to their members, and a part of the take for each MechWarrior in the Merc Corps should pay into a sort of bank to help their comrades in their Corps to build things up, make repairs better, etc. That's only logical. Keep C-Bills in the Merc Corps, not transferable out, and make it so equipment can't be transferred between non-cooperating Merc Corps' (man, this term really bothers me... it's not a corporation, it's a unit) as something of a payoff, either.

[Motionless]

If there is no voice, there better be faster ways to communicate than typing (think tribes: ascend voices, being able to press VSDF and then VAF to let your team know that you are going to be on flag defense and you want to make sure someone or your team is actually going for the flag is way easier than typing it. Even the voice type will give away what class you probably are so your teamates have an idea of your capabilities as a defender/chaser.)

I think our mechs are advanced enough to install a CB or something though. I'm pretty used to having voice in games now, I really don't like the idea of playing without it.

Technoviking, on 05 April 2012 - 09:38 AM, said:

World of Warcraft, a giant of a game had VOIP, they developed it, polished it and submitted it.

Nobody used it.

Gaming guilds USUALLY do more than just play one game, or they have "Pregame" meetings, Post game meetings... Private meetings...

All of these things usually point to a 3rd Party vendor for Comms.


The only people who would use VOIP are the unaffiliated new people, who would either be:

A. Too Casual to use
B. Too Shy to use
C. Not shy at all and talkative and annoying and make funny sounds or yell or *Click*

Waste of resources.

3rd party programs was the established way of doing things before WoW brought in their VOIP. Go play on some TF2 servers or something, people talking and communicating all over the place.

Edited by Motionless, 05 April 2012 - 10:43 AM.

[Felicitatem Parco]

I am one of the few who would like every opportunity to delve deeper into the gamin experience. In-game VoIP would have been an excellent opportunity for that, with the potential for comm interruptions, hacking, etc as laid out previously. Unfortunately, I live in a world where people play-to-win instead of play-to-play.



Is there any chance that an in-game VoIP option would make it into MW:O in years future if the community eventually demonstrates enough interest? I would pay for the ability to have the enemy mess up my communications. I would pay cash for the ability to be put at such a disadvantage aginst an enemy who uses 3rd party apps. I know you could never ban 3rd party programs, but I would be very proud to utilize an in-game voice program that is subject to the conditions of battle.

[wwiiogre]

I am with Prosperity Park on this, the immersion would be amazing and make the game play better.

chris

[Grithis]

This issue has been worrisome for me. I'm not going into this with any friends. This means that EVERY SINGLE game I join, I'm going to have to find out whether they're using TS, Vent, or whatever else there is. If I have it, fine. If not, I've gotta go download it. I'm then going to have to log into thier specific server. Then figure out who the hell I'm talking to, because not everyone in there is going to be in the match, trust me.

Altogether, this sounds like one part assumption, two parts we just don't want to deal with it. Inconvenient for them, so those of us who are friendless and have no previous ties via MW4 and such get hung out to dry.

[Felicitatem Parco]

I half-agree; I agree that people like me and Grithis without significant experience using 3rd party voice apps and a huge rolodex of chums will have a hard time keeping in communications with our Lancemates. I was, in fact, counting on in-game VoIP.


I strongly disagree about the laziness part.



Edit: I am greatly saddened to hear the infoirmation in that quoted statement provided by the Original Poster. One of the things I was counting on most was the disruption of private comms during close-quaters battle when everything gets hectic; that would have been adrenaline-inducing awesomeness.

I am going to play the Beta without a 3rd party voice application. That is how I will test it - as it is. If it's lacking significant functionality due to the provided in-game communications system, then I will report on the game as I see it. If what they provides winds up working fine and allows decent team coordination, then I will report it as I see it.

I am not going to use Teamspeak unless I decide that the in-game comms system is insufficient, and if that happens then I will be disueded from playing as frequently as I had originally planned.

Edited by Prosperity Park, 05 April 2012 - 11:01 AM.

[Aegis Kleais]

Bryan Ekman, on 05 April 2012 - 09:58 AM, said:

We have contextual command/order menus that all players can use. So that should go a long way to solving the OPs needs (I hope).

This in tandem with a script-based "bind" system (where you can custom bind lance/team/global chat text) would be more than ample.

For times when I want to communicate in a pub, I'd like the ability to setup keys (and key combos) to automatically build chat.

ie, by pressing a series of buttons that are bound to phrases I define, I could say

"Solo Tango Spotted"
"Grid Sector Hotel Four (H4)"
"Heading Zero Niner Zero (090)"
"Moving to Engage"

With the press of 4 buttons rather than having my hands off the controls for 20 seconds.

I would LOVE a bind system to supplement a command rose.

[Cochise]

There are so many free or extremely cheap options available that I don't think it really matters.

Mumble
Teamspeak
Ventrilo
Skype

... and there are probably others I don't even know about. There will also probably be hot keys for keyboard voice comms (ala MWLL) so that you can issue simple chat commands etc etc. What's the fuss?