83 replies to this topic

[Peiper]

A couple of things:

4 and 8 are the numbers because the basic battlemech squad is 4. It's called a lance. 3 lances make a company, etc... The Clans use 5 man 'stars' as their squad. It also puzzles me why WoTanks uses 3 as the maximum number. For example, the basic German tank platoon is 5, and 4 platoons, plus two command tanks make up a company. http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Lance#Lance

Really, though, and FAR more importantly:

8 man teams are currenly so messed up, that many veterans are avoiding them. This is for two primary reasons:

1. 4 man plus pug teams are balanced by weight. 8 mans are not. So, in looking for a FAIR fight, veterans are playing in 4 man drops. Nothing like bringing a couple of light/medium lances into a fight only to find you're fighting 8 Atlas DC's.

2. ECM has zapped the variety of mechs out of 8 man drops. I dropped yesterday in a 4 man drop and was elated to find that it was made up of 2 lights, 5 mediums and one catapult. Only the commandos had ECM. It was one hell of a furball, and it was a blast! ECM has destroyed the purpose of many mechs at the moment, and until they fix this problem, and the drop weight discrepencies, my mercs will spend the majority of their drops in 4 mans having fun!

[Shootu]

Peiper, on 08 December 2012 - 12:40 PM, said:

A couple of things:

4 and 8 are the numbers because the basic battlemech squad is 4. It's called a lance. 3 lances make a company, etc... The Clans use 5 man 'stars' as their squad. It also puzzles me why WoTanks uses 3 as the maximum number. For example, the basic German tank platoon is 5, and 4 platoons, plus two command tanks make up a company. http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Lance#Lance

WOT went with a max group size of 3 for play balance in PUG's. It is as simple as that.

[neviu]

the problem lies whit people, that are only doing 70 dmg on a pug,,
not whit premades,
if the pug works good there shouldnt be a problem

[AndyHill]

Peiper, on 08 December 2012 - 12:40 PM, said:

4 and 8 are the numbers because the basic battlemech squad is 4. It's called a lance. 3 lances make a company, etc... The Clans use 5 man 'stars' as their squad. It also puzzles me why WoTanks uses 3 as the maximum number. For example, the basic German tank platoon is 5, and 4 platoons, plus two command tanks make up a company. http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Lance#Lance

As already stated, it's as simple as being the max number of people in a platoon that doesn't upset game balance too much. In a game with 15 tanks per side. I'm not the first one to suggest going against canon, but I don't really see lances as an important element in a pub game, at all. They're basically mercenary contracts and mercs operate in groups of any size anyway.

[NoxMorbis]

Shootu, on 07 December 2012 - 09:19 PM, said:

Ok Nox, you can go troll elsewhere now. It should be pretty clear this thread has nothing to do with 8 vs 8 premade teams... Hence PUG used everywhere including the title.

You might want to reread the responses then because there is a lot of pug vs premade discussion going on bro.

The way I see this entire discussion about unfairnessss boils down to something like this:

(1) I get my *** kicked.

(2) I'm too lazy, uninterested, unable to increase my skill level (for whatever reasons) including:

(3) I'm refuse to go to Team Speak 9et al.) and find people to play with and take the time to cultivate online relationships with a base of people I like and love to play with.

(4) I'm not going to communicate in order to play better.

(5) Therefore, everyone else's playstyle should placate my playstyle, which is noncummunicative, solitary, and unwilling to interact with others to increase my play skills.

You know, that's fine with me. It's just not my play sytle. And from my expereince, I'm 51 and started with DOOM, when a game caters to the lowest common denomminator, like I expressed above, the game becomes boring and people hard core enough to pay for things stop playing. The result is another failed game from a "lowest common denominator" ideology.

If we really delude ourselves into thinking that taking choice from players, like weight balancing, and other aspects that force a human to actually think about his or her consequences, then we're only shooting ourselves in the proverbial foot. The game WILL DIE.

In my next thread, I'll propose a solution to this dilemma.

Edited by NoxMorbis, 08 December 2012 - 02:45 PM.

[Shootu]

Here is a summary of the thread for anyone new to it and doesn't want to read the whole thing. Please at least read the original post.

To summarize, most agree that 4 person groups with teams of 8 is too much for an even playing field. What is always debatable is what should be done about it. Some agree with me that the group size should be reduced for PUG matches. Some feel it is fine the way it is and everyone should just group. Some feel the matchmaker needs to make sure there are an even number of groups on each side of the match. One went into more detail on how to balance the groups across the teams. Some feel team communication via voice will solve the imbalances. Some feel if drop syncing was eliminated it would fix the problem. Of course, we also have some that just feel people should learn to play and deal with it. And we have one that feels any balancing efforts makes the game boring and will cause it to die.

I think that about sums it up so far.

Edited by Shootu, 09 December 2012 - 01:12 PM.

[Elder Thorn]

Peiper, on 08 December 2012 - 12:40 PM, said:

1. 4 man plus pug teams are balanced by weight. 8 mans are not. So, in looking for a FAIR fight, veterans are playing in 4 man drops. Nothing like bringing a couple of light/medium lances into a fight only to find you're fighting 8 Atlas DC's.

so... 8 man games might be broken or not, i am not to judge, but i find ind very funny, that someone says, they are looking for a fair fight and dont get it with 8 man groups... did you confuse fair with easy?
Don't get me wrong it just so laughable

[Quad Ace]

Go find yourself a team to play this TEAM-BASED game with. You'll have more fun, win or lose.

[Shootu]

Lost Opportunity:

One more small piece of evidence that suggests we need to address the PUG imbalance in order to attract new players and retain them.

Last night a friend that isn't a gamer stopped by my house because he is buying a new computer and I've finally convinced him to buy a computer that is powerful enough to play some high end games. So he says show me what you are playing and let me see what these games look like.

So my first thought was I'll show him MWO. It was about 10 PM central time in the US so I tell him this is prime time so I'm going to show you a match but one of the teams will most likely get crushed and since I'm running solo it will mostly likely be the team I'm on. The match won't be competitive so don't put too much weight on that right now because there are some match making issues. His response was "huh?" I said I'll show you and then explain.

I bring up the game and drop into a PUG match. Unfortunately, my team apparently was on the receiving end of a drop sync. Within a few minutes my team was dead. I was the last one alive and my friend is watching and saying what the hell is going on? Eventually they surround me and kill me. I was top damage dealer on my team by a wide margin but since it was 1 vs 8 I couldn't actually get a killing blow on any of them although I gave it a hell of a try. As I was fighting, the adverts were coming through the chat for the group on the other side. One of the dead players on my team asked in chat why are you drop syncing in PUB's when 8 vs 8 premades are available. The response was essentially because rolling PUG's is more fun.

My friend had no idea what any of this means as he is seeing it but the match ends 0-8. My friend simply asked how can a match be that unbalanced. It wasn't even close. I explained to him that each side can have groups of up to 4 players and that some groups that have 8 players try to exploit the system by entering the match queue at the same time trying to get all 8 players on the same team.

He was just shaking his head. So he says, so let me get this straight one group can be half of a team and sometimes one team is all the same group and they are playing against random people. He says that doesn't make any sense he must not be understanding it correctly. I explain nope, you understand it correctly unfortunately that is the way it is.

Now this is not someone with 17,000 WOT games or any games in MWO or any other competitive team based game and it was crystal clear to him that the situation was not even close to a fair playing field. He couldn't understand how something like that would even be implemented in the first place. As a side note, we are both in IT and have been for 25+ years, so we do have a technical background and this situation just didn't make sense to him or me for that matter.

So he says how can you be competitive, even if you are a great player you can't overcome those odds. My response was well right now all you can do is play in a group. His response was simply wow that is one hell of a bad design. I can't argue with it, because it is and the majority of us know it.

So although the game was beautiful (I got the new night version of the snow city map) he simply said non-competitive matches are not any fun so show me something else.

An opportunity was lost just that quick and this is the type of person PGI needs to "hook". He is a well paid individual that has expendable income he was willing to spend on a game but his first impression was so unfavorable due to the PUG imbalance he wasn't even interested in seeing another match.

I can't help but wonder how common this is.

Edited by Shootu, 09 December 2012 - 01:31 PM.

[Ghoullees]

Groups, any premade, should be matched equally against the same size premade.

We have seen recently going from 8 man groups, back down to 4, and now back up to 8.

I would actually like to see: 2,4,6 & 8 man group options. Each, to be matched against the same.

Thats a level playing field then, regardless.

[Rocket2Uranus]

Match making is horrid in game.
On top of it, majority of players using trial mechs. Trial mechs are basically nothing but fodder. And even at they, they blow at being fodder.

[Willie Sauerland]

Also, given the typical 8v8 matches are the equivalent of a PUG stomp because there is no weight matching and most teams seem to run 6 ECM Atlases and 2 ECM Ravens, I can see where running a 4-man group would be more interesting. The sad thing is, there are groups with so many members that they are able to drop without actually trying to get into the same team. Once they find themselves in the same match, they drop to one of their TS channels and overrun the other team.

The match-making is broken, but the idea that 4 people being on a team making it over-powered are not. Again, there have been plenty of 4-man teams who have had their collective mech hindquarters handed to them by a group of 8 people working together via the limited communication possibilities.

[Greyfyl]

Kenshar, on 07 December 2012 - 09:37 PM, said:

-1 from me!

This is a team tactical game. Dropping with units is a big part of the game. If you are having problems in a game with pugs vs 4 man premades maybe it is time to either A. Start speaking up in matches and organize your group with a game plan.... or B. Find some people that you enjoy playing with. This is not Call of Duty. One person is not the focus of the game. Team experience has always been the name of the game when it comes to Mechwarrior. Catering to individuals over teams has never been the case of any MW game and I hope it doesn't become the case now.

Once again for the 12 millionth time in response to your options....

A - Unless the guys in the premade are terrible, people using in game text chat are not going to consistently beat players using TS or other voice comms. Your option A is pointless and doesn't address the problem at all.

B. A large percentage of the gaming community WILL NOT GET ON A 3RD PARTY COMM SYSTEM. End of story - the game either has to have in-game voice chat or it needs to get the premades out of the pug groups. Why doesn't matter.

[Adrienne Vorton]

Shootu, on 07 December 2012 - 01:40 AM, said:

please explain what the downside is to capping PUG groups at 2. 8 vs 8 premade matchups are now in the game so there is an avenue for a more competitive game. I can't see any reason for the "need" for 4 man groups in PUG's unless I simply want an advantage over random competition.

simple... i have 2 RL friends i play with from time to time...

[Bobzilla]

I only solo pug. Pre-mades are unblanced vs pugs.
I have played other games with friends and wouldn't want to break up the pre-mades as games are more fun when shared with friends.
I think if they match pre-mades with pre-mades of the same size and fill what evers left over, if any, with solo's it would be balanced. This would probably cause a long wait for matches so maybe have a +/- of one.
Even if its 2 three man PMs and 2 solos vs 1 six man PM and 2 solos, it would help.
At current, I seem forced to just rush in and try to straight out dps mechs before I die or be left last to have the whole opposing team kill me.

[InfiniteChaos]

For Bobzilla and everybody complaining that a premade is unbalanced vs a PUG. Simply; do you see yellow battle markers on your map? No? Then you guys are aimlessly stomping around on the ground and not staying organized. Following a commander's direction is what the other 3 guys are doing in a premade. If the other PUG's are following the yellow map markers and doing what the icon says, then it will give an appearance of an 8 man premade.

Tell scouts to gather intel on your flanks, push as a group, defend as a group. If you split your team to 4 two-man lances all going different directions, then your team will die two at a time with a result of 0-8. When the enemy is slow and too far away from base, tell scouts to stand on their base. If you have a keyboard that can use a macro, program a couple keys for general orders that you find yourself giving a lot.

Additionally, if you see other people firing at a specific mech, also fire at that mech. A dead mech does 0 damage.

Finally, Russ mentioned that the goal for PGI is for 12v12. Having a lance of 4 is perfect for a 12v12. A group of 4 still gets roflstomped by an organized group of random PUG's. Russ' interview: http://nogutsnogalax...2-russ-bullock/

Edited by InfiniteChaos, 10 December 2012 - 07:19 AM.

[Greyfyl]

Chaos - what the hell are you babbling about?

[Bobzilla]

InfiniteChaos, on 10 December 2012 - 07:16 AM, said:

For Bobzilla and everybody complaining that a premade is unbalanced vs a PUG. Simply; do you see yellow battle markers on your map? No? Then you guys are aimlessly stomping around on the ground and not staying organized. Following a commander's direction is what the other 3 guys are doing in a premade. If the other PUG's are following the yellow map markers and doing what the icon says, then it will give an appearance of an 8 man premade.

Tell scouts to gather intel on your flanks, push as a group, defend as a group. If you split your team to 4 two-man lances all going different directions, then your team will die two at a time with a result of 0-8. When the enemy is slow and too far away from base, tell scouts to stand on their base. If you have a keyboard that can use a macro, program a couple keys for general orders that you find yourself giving a lot.

Additionally, if you see other people firing at a specific mech, also fire at that mech. A dead mech does 0 damage.

Finally, Russ mentioned that the goal for PGI is for 12v12. Having a lance of 4 is perfect for a 12v12. A group of 4 still gets roflstomped by an organized group of random PUG's. Russ' interview: http://nogutsnogalax...2-russ-bullock/

First, I didn't complain, just stated a fact from my experince and went as far to say PM's shouldn't be broken up.
Second, There are rarely commanders in pugs, like maybe 1% of the time, and most don't listen to it and im guessing PM's just use VOIP (i would, why waste the space).
Third, "tell scouts" yeah, you try that with random people and see how well that works for ya and get back to me.
Fourth, One person cannot attack and defend together. Yeah a lot of Pugs have the majority of mechs starting out together, but as soon as the contact happens its just chaos.
Fifth, And there is no such thing as "an organized group of random PUG's", you can't describe something random as organized. Yes sometimes a PUG reacts well together, but im guessing its when experienced players happen to be matched up with each other.

[Syllogy]

Make Friends.

Problem Solved.

[Shootu]

Adrienne Vorton, on 10 December 2012 - 12:53 AM, said:

simple... i have 2 RL friends i play with from time to time...

As do I (and more) so I guess the question is what do we do? What do people with 5 - 7 RL friends do now? We either get enough people together to play 8 vs 8 premades against others or we split into smaller groups. I don't want to see a mechanic in a game that skews the gaming experience for everyone because from time to time I want to play with exactly two friends.

So if you are suggesting that you have exactly two friends and two friends only that you want to play with then yes you would be negatively impacted. Whenever a change is made there is always a segment in the player base that is negatively impacted. The question is does it improve the experience for more people than it negatively impacts. I would argue it would have a positive impact for far more players than it would have a negative impact for simply because the PUG experience would be more competitive by limiting the influence one group has on the overall match.

Edited by Shootu, 10 December 2012 - 10:23 AM.