191 replies to this topic

[Hayashi]

Vlad Ward, on 02 December 2012 - 12:59 PM, said:

Yup, exactly.

There was a thread on that a couple days ago, but, as things go, it generally devolved into junk.

The general take-away was that, in cases where the final member of an enemy team is live and running around, capping is usually more efficient (especially if they're a fast light or a heavily damaged larger mech). However, if you're dealing with an AFK or a Disconnect, you should almost always hold the long-range fire and just headshot it. The only real exception is a stock commando, or any other Mech that looks like it has a total value below 3,000,000 c-bills.

I suppose there is the cap XP to consider, but I honestly just ignore XP at this stage of the game. You accumulate it so much faster than c-bills that you almost always end up with massive stockpiles of Mech XP by the time you have enough money to buy a new Mech.

The funny thing is that there are some players who go to the extent of teamkilling players who fire at the last AFK mech based on the misconception that killing the last Mech is always not as good as capping - a misconception I also had prior to you posting that. Not sure if this was the reason why the thread you speak of devolved; I never actually did see it.

[p4r4g0n]

Thanks Vlad & Hayashi for the excellent explanations.

General rule of thumb: Capping is better for the team XP wise but head shotting or killing via legs that last mech is better C-Bills wise unless its a mech worth less than 3 million. Since it is almost impossible in most cases to get that clean kill on that last mech, capping is probably better.

Sound about right?

Errrm, apologies to OP for thread hijacking.

Edited by p4r4g0n, 02 December 2012 - 01:07 PM.

[Tickdoff Tank]

Hayashi, on 02 December 2012 - 12:31 PM, said:

I'm not too sure actually what salvage calculation entails. It seems to be directly proportional to number of kills and inversely proportional to amount of damage done.

In terms of XP, because only the killer generally gets XP, capping is always better on the whole. In terms of C-Bills, I'm not too sure.

I'm getting figures of about 4k-8k salvage per mech on average, plus a kill bonus of 2k.

Capture is 5000, capture assist is 2500. Kill XP is about 100xp to killer only. Capture xp is 75 to entire team, 125 to those who capture.

6k-10k + 100xp to killer only for killing last mech.
5k-7.5k + 75-125xp to entire team for capturing.

So it looks like killing the last mech is something advantageous only if you don't care about your teammates at all, and C-Bills is more important than XP to you.

Salvage is 2% of the value of the undestroyed equipment on defeated mechs. That 2% is then divided up among the winning team. So if you dropped with only 7 you will get more salvage. (meaning there is only 7 names on your list, counting DCs).

Highest salvage I have ever seen was around 90-91k. I have friends that have gotten more than 120k in salvage though.

[Hayashi]

p4r4g0n, on 02 December 2012 - 01:04 PM, said:

Thanks Vlad & Hayashi for the excellent explanations.

General rule of thumb: Capping is better for the team XP wise but head shotting or killing via legs that last mech is better C-Bills wise unless its a mech worth less than 3 million. Since it is almost impossible in most cases to get that clean kill on that last mech, capping is probably better.

Sound about right?

Errrm, apologies to OP for thread hijacking.

Vlad should take all the credit for that really, but as a summary: for C-Bills:

1. If enemy is AFK at base, and he's not a Commando or Raven, kill via cockpit crit.
2. If enemy is not AFK, and he's a very expensive Heavy or Assault, kill via CT crit.
3. If enemy is either an AFK light or non-afk Zombie build, cap.
4. If you're not in a position to fight, cap.
5. Your choices shouldn't be imposed on your teammates.

I think that's pretty much it.

[Vlad Ward]

Hayashi, on 02 December 2012 - 01:04 PM, said:

The funny thing is that there are some players who go to the extent of teamkilling players who fire at the last AFK mech based on the misconception that killing the last Mech is always not as good as capping - a misconception I also had prior to you posting that. Not sure if this was the reason why the thread you speak of devolved; I never actually did see it.

It was a combination of a lot of things. Quite a few people came in with the idea that the OP was talking about live Mechs like Jenners and such, too, and the conversation never really stayed on the same topic for more than a couple posts.

Even more came in claiming that they had done their own "work" on determining Salvage rewards and posted really random stuff that was based more on gut instinct than anything else. The model I described here is the one the Devs gave us explicitly in Closed Beta Update #12 on 9/25. They left off the part about splitting the reward 8 ways, but as you pointed out it's necessary to have that split there to make the numbers work out.

Likewise, it makes a lot of sense from a development perspective because it means they won't have to worry about rebalancing the economy when we get 12v12 matches. A total Salvage pool split between every member of the team means that Salvage rewards will stay roughly the same no matter how many Mechs are in a match (killing 1.5x the number of Mechs and then splitting the rewards 1.5x as many ways results in multiplying by 1).

There's really a lot of misconception out there regarding basic game mechanics like Salvage and Critical Hits. I know the Devs (and even some of the programmers) have come in and posted very nice, detailed explanations of these systems (Crits in particular), but their posts always manage to get buried in the extremely high thread turnaround that GD has. I still see people talking about Crits that deal bonus damage or Engine Crits that kill your Mech when neither exist in the current iteration of the game.

p4r4g0n, on 02 December 2012 - 01:04 PM, said:

Thanks Vlad & Hayashi for the excellent explanations.

General rule of thumb: Capping is better for the team XP wise but head shotting or killing via legs that last mech is better C-Bills wise unless its a mech worth less than 3 million. Since it is almost impossible in most cases to get that clean kill on that last mech, capping is probably better.

Sound about right?

Errrm, apologies to OP for thread hijacking.

Yup, pretty much. The primary reason it's hard to get a clean kill on that last Mech is the communication barrier in PUGs. If you're in a team, or you're with PUGs that are listening, it's a lot easier to get a clean kill on the last Mech.

This is especially difficult if you have LRM users on your team. They really need to be told right away if an enemy needs to be left alone, as they don't have very much context at the distance they fire at. On top of that, LRMs have a tendency to totally scrap enemy Mechs and generally ruin Salvage values pretty quickly. It's a lose-lose for those guys.

Edited by Vlad Ward, 02 December 2012 - 01:25 PM.

[Tickdoff Tank]

Copy paste from another thread, where I did a little math about salvage:

Tickdoff Tank, on 30 November 2012 - 12:29 PM, said:

Salvage is awarded to the winning team and is equal to 2% of the undestroyed equipment on defeated mechs. That 2% is then divided up by all members of the team. To maximize your salvage you want to defeat an enemy mech while doing the least amount of damage required to do so. This usually means headshots, followed by taking out both legs. Blowing the torsos (especially if they store ammo there) is the worst way to build up your salavge bonus.

(all salvage listed is per person)

A salvaged 100 STD engine gives 1532.83 credits to each person on the winning team. A 200STD gives 3066.5, 300STD is 4600 and a 390STD is 5980.

100XL gives 4082.08, 200XL is 8166.25, 300XL is 12250 and 390XL gives 15925.

That is not even counting the additional equipment on the mechs.

My favorite Cataphract:

CTF-2X

270STD (4140 salvage)
AC20 (1500 salvage)
2 Medium Lasers (400 salvage)
1 Large Laser (500 salavge)
2 SSRM2s (150 salvage)
5 tons AC20 ammo (125 salvage)
2 tons SSRM ammo (270 salvage)
2 DHS (60 salvage)
416 points armor (325.2 salvage)

If you take out the head on my mech without doing any additional damage to my mech you will get 7470.2 C-bills per person. Technically a little less but I am not going to do the math on losing 18 points armor. If you strip off every single point of armor and all my equipment except my engine you will get 4140 salvage. So you should cap instead of killing me, because you will most likely do enough damage to me to drop your possible salvage bonus.

If I am in my Dragon with a 325 XL you get 13270 c-bills for killing me without hurting my engine. So you would want to take out my legs instead of capping.

[ApolloKaras]

Fugu, on 02 December 2012 - 12:51 PM, said:

Because I don't give a toss about you guys and I don't want to play with you. It's really that simple. Randumbs can die in a fire for all I care. Especially considering that I have to deal with them in my team because of their whining in the first place.

I'm just waiting for thursday so I don't have to have random guys in my team ever again. Good riddance!

maybe you should play a single player game.

[KingNobody]

Dagnome, on 01 December 2012 - 11:41 AM, said:

If someone asks I will tell them when I am in a premade and in the occasional off game I will announce it. You want to know what the stigma is?

70% of the time the other 4 individuals on my team DONT DO anything intelligent thus I just consider them all glorified meat shields for the 4 of us to actually attempt to win the game.

Much love
-Dagnome

Yes, it's their fault that you don't communicate. And signing off with "much love" is such great irony, as the post is full of hate.

[p4r4g0n]

Sigh ... guess this is the point this thread devolves into another premade player vs pug player hate fest?

[jakucha]

We get to see a sample size of the Mechwarrior Online community through these forums, and it's laughable at best. Still not as bad as the project reality community though.

[Vaenson]

Tickdoff Tank, on 02 December 2012 - 12:45 PM, said:

I don't chat because I hate you and want to watch you fail in the mission, rage quit and uninstall.

Fugu, on 02 December 2012 - 12:51 PM, said:

Because I don't give a toss about you guys and I don't want to play with you. It's really that simple. Randumbs can die in a fire for all I care. Especially considering that I have to deal with them in my team because of their whining in the first place.

I'm just waiting for thursday so I don't have to have random guys in my team ever again. Good riddance!

yes

[Secundus]

jakucha, on 02 December 2012 - 01:59 PM, said:

We get to see a sample size of the Mechwarrior Online community through these forums, and it's laughable at best. Still not as bad as the project reality community though.

I was going to refer to project reality as an example of a game I can put up with the bugs and unpolished nature since it's a community made mod. Apparently someone else here has played it.

[jakucha]

Secundus, on 02 December 2012 - 02:02 PM, said:

I was going to refer to project reality as an example of a game I can put up with the bugs and unpolished nature since it's a community made mod. Apparently someone else here has played it.

It's a fun game. Just, pretty much any of the surviving servers force you to use mumble or you get kicked last I checked. I was in an admin's squad as the US army, we were going through an alley way and I was in the back. I was the only one who noticed an enemy sneaking up from behind so I took him out before he shot us all up, and a few minutes later another guy that came in through an opening in the side. Saved them twice, and 3 minutes later after following them I get kicked by the admin, not even auto-kicked. Like I said, fun game, terrible community.

Edited by jakucha, 02 December 2012 - 02:07 PM.

[Demoned]

4 man grps don't chat because.
we are waiting to see what the rest of the pugs are doing,
so we can make a plan and cover the weak side of the map.
allow our pugs to become bait, allow enemy team to engage them,
then swing around the back and rolf stomp the enemy from their rear flank XD

works wonders

[Hayashi]

p4r4g0n, on 02 December 2012 - 01:48 PM, said:

Sigh ... guess this is the point this thread devolves into another premade player vs pug player hate fest?

Seems that way, I think the main answers we needed already appeared in page 3-5.

In summary:

Premades sometimes don't talk to PuGs because of the following reasons (valid or not you can decide for yourself):
1. The premade-PuG hate causes some premades to get hit with friendly fire, or be blamed for the loss of the match, so they would rather not expose themselves to that, for even if it's a rare occurrence, it spoils their day, and they'd rather not have that when they're trying to relax.
2. The premades are already coordinating amongst each other via voice comms, and don't really want to also have to type as well beyond very limited communication at the start of the match, since it's hard to type and fight.
3. A lot of PuGs don't listen when communicated to. Unknown whether the high rates of non-response are because they're unlucky, because they don't communicate in a respectful way, or that they've given up at the first impression and haven't really tried to do this for very long. Some premades give up on PuGs entirely, some premades use this assumed behaviour of PuGs as a tactic to use them as meatshields or whatnot.
4. Some premades just don't believe the PuGs are capable of anything at all, so they think any effort to this to be a waste of time.

And the following factors that don't directly answer the question, but are related to the topic have been mentioned:
1. PuG command is even rarer than premade command, and it's odd to expect the premades to always be the ones initiating if the PuGs don't try to communicate.
2. Some PuGs will respond to feedback and command, but don't want to take command or responsibility themselves.
3. Communication generally improves the result of games, but the frustration involved may not always be worth the result to some players.

Solutions:
1. Improve the ingame communication system by properly instituting C3 VoIP for all PuG groups by default - making voice comms an opt-out option instead of opt-in, to improve participation rates. - PGI side.
2. Improve nonverbal communication systems with quick chats via dialogue wheels or F-keys so it's not so suicidal to attempt communication via non-verbal channels in combat, but still have the advantage of not requiring VoIP equipment or the ability to hear. - PGI side.
3. Without attempting to treat the other side with respect, premade-PuG communication will fail - attempts to try to treat each other well will yield better results. - Player side.

Though the direction the thread is heading in shows that #3 is unlikely to really be a possible solution any time soon.

Did I get it all?

---

If the thread doesn't generate anything new pertaining to OP's direction and devolves into only anti-premade and anti-PuG sentiment within the next few pages, I'll shut it down. That is not to say the early stage of this thread wasn't a relatively good one.

Edited by Hayashi, 02 December 2012 - 02:16 PM.

[anthony gryphon]

Most premades that I know of don't follow the pug's plan because pugs are unknown elements. Most of us just assume they are going to run off and die on their own no matter what the plan is. It's easier to just stick to our own small unit tactics and let superior small unit tactics carry the day.

[QuantumButler]

anthony gryphon, on 02 December 2012 - 02:11 PM, said:

Most premades that I know of don't follow the pug's plan because pugs are unknown elements. Most of us just assume they are going to run off and die on their own no matter what the plan is. It's easier to just stick to our own small unit tactics and let superior small unit tactics carry the day.

it is often a safe assumption.

I love it when the "don't go into the water, it's a death trap!" advice is given, and then all the pugs in the team run into the water and die.

[Kaijin]

Hayashi, on 02 December 2012 - 01:04 PM, said:

The funny thing is that there are some players who go to the extent of teamkilling players who fire at the last AFK mech based on the misconception that killing the last Mech is always not as good as capping - a misconception I also had prior to you posting that. Not sure if this was the reason why the thread you speak of devolved; I never actually did see it.

Players using trial mechs do not get any XP for base capture or anything else. They figure they'll gain more C-Bills from component destruction on an AFK mech, though they might actually make more with their cut of the salvage from cockpitting it only.

[Passenger]

I always throw out a "4-man going 3/4 line" or whatever, but I usually get silence. I've also lost track of the number of times I've had someone say "F*** you, you're not in charge" when someone throws out a "Focus C" in team chat...it dampens the enthusiasm some to get that response.

Honestly, 50%+ of the time someone responds it's another premade saying "We're 3 here, sounds good" (I've had the occasional "FU" from premades as well, but it's rare).

I still don't get people who choose to play a tactical team combat game yet complain about having to play on a team. To me, it seems like playing Madden and then complaining it's not an in-depth statistics and team-management simulator. I can only say I hope they get the solaris area running for folks so they can play the way they want, because I can't imagine the current game is overly fun for them either. I'm also glad that after Phase 2 matchmaking I no longer have to listen some random stranger with 121 damage telling me that I lost him the game with my 500+ damage and 3 kills.

Edited by Passenger, 02 December 2012 - 04:21 PM.

[Sevaradan]

I always find it funny when someone in my lance announces our plan and the pugs agree like they have a choice in the matter...