9 replies to this topic

[MythicKhan]

This has cropped up occasionally on the House Marik discussion thread, and so I wracked my rookie brains and thought I'd present an idea to the developers.

The Problem: House Ranks are denoted by playing the game as a "faction player", these points rank up and so the player ends up with a certain rank reflecting their status. All well and good. However, these ranks may not reflect the actual command ability of a member of the House. Say there's a FWL General in the drop-zone, who's really good at assaulting, but not good at command. Even if there's an expert commander in the lance, how will everyone know to give command to that experienced old timer rather than to the FWL Marshal-With-Stars-And-Whistles?

Solution 1 (and my preferred idea): The House ranks in game are changed so that players earn rank points in their roles... so someone with loads of points earned as a scout will gain ranks like "Scout-Captain" or "Scout-General" to allow players to distinguish between roles. Players will have the right to pick which role warfare rank they display to their comrades in the Mechlab or profile screen, or whatever. (Say I'm a Scout-Captain, Command-Lieutenant and a Assault-Brigadier. I want to improve my scouting, or want to play as a scout, so I chose the first rank to be displayed.)

Solution 2: The House Ranks are replaced with a medal scheme, and the Houses have their own rank system to denote command. The problem with this is it may reverse the trend, and so great fighters have lower ranks than great commanders. Or perish the thought.... SOCIAL GENERALS!!!

Solution 3 (also nice and easy): The House Ranks are displayed as is, but the House communities are given tools to denote lance captains, commanders, generals and so forth. Perhaps a star system? So in game the player is a "General", and is given a star rank by the House. That way, players know to place command in the higher starred officers, whatever their technical rank in game. I.E. A captain with four stars will lead the lance, rather than a general with one star.

Well, I've said my piece. What do people think?

Oh, and FEAR THE EAGLE

Edited by MythicKhan, 16 May 2012 - 02:33 PM.

[Arikiel]

A General directly involved in combat? The highest rank you'd ever hope to see out there is a Colonel. Generals are purely administrators.

Anywho! As for the topic at hand I'm a bit worried about it myself. I can just imagine a company full of nothing but Captains and Majors and a single Corporal who just just started playing the game. Not sure how they really handle that though. Maybe only allow X number of slots of each rank per faction. I suppose that would be a way of getting people to move over to underpopulated factions. But then how to select those players? *shrugs*

[Heron]

Developer Q&A 2

Quote

Paul - Rank does NOT equal command during a match. You do not get to tell people what to do because you’re senior rank, you do not make important faction calls, etc. Rank is purely a reward system for consistent and successful gameplay.

[MythicKhan]

Hi Heron,

I know that rank does not equal command, but how are all people to know that? I'm saying we should have a means of identifying House commanders beyond the in-game ranks.

As Arikiel says, how do we know which person to put in command if we're all captains? Or a spread of ranks? We can't expect everyone to know that "X is big in our House, so he must command this game", not everyone will have access or bother to look up that information!

Anyway, it's just a suggestion.

[00dlez]

I think you are putting a lot of undue weight on the ranking system. I dont argue that teamwork will carry the day, but there is nothing that forces players to follow the plans and "orders" of an "officer" they have never met, played with before, or possibly never play with again. If a stranger in a match tells me to go east, I'm only going to go east if I want to/agree its a good idea.The ranks are more fluff than anything. While they might give credence to ones abilities on the battlefield, its not a real military command structures and theres no penalty or disincentive to ignoring orders.

[MythicKhan]

Nevermind!

[Havoc2]

I liked the Rift system for queueing up for random matches.

Choose the role you want to fill and if on a 12v12 match there are slots for 2 recon, 4 support, 5 brawler/harrasser (best fit I could think of for medium/heavy/assault chassis without a specific role like fire support or recon) and 1 command.

You select your preferred roles before the match (say you prefer command or recon) you check the Command and Recon slots and then queue.

The match making system uses its magical formula to match combatants, and those roles are filled from people who have selected which role they want to fill.
It could go further and restrict you from certain roles based on what you have in your MechLab. I.e. if all you have is a Raven, you wouldn't be able to select a fire support role.

[Kell]

00dlez, on 17 May 2012 - 06:25 AM, said:

. I dont argue that teamwork will carry the day, but there is nothing that forces players to follow the plans and "orders" of an "officer" they have never met, played with before, or possibly never play with again. If a stranger in a match tells me to go east, I'm only going to go east if I want to/agree its a good idea.The ranks are more fluff than anything. While they might give credence to ones abilities on the battlefield, its not a real military command structures and theres no penalty or disincentive to ignoring orders.

Unfortunately, this is Mechwarrior. You are better off doing the wrong thing with the team than doing the right thing by yourself.

Furthermore, for most of the guys interested in MWO, they come from previous iterations where Rank actually mattered significantly. The balance needs to be between command and playtime. Obviously new players need to be allowed the opportunity to rank up, as this will draw in more players. However, I feel that there should be battle ranks (which signify how much one has played and the experience they accumulated) and political ranks (for those who are more apt towards commanding as they are more respected, etc.) It's a fine line, but a necessary one in a Mechwarrior Universe.

[Death Mallet]

How will command of the group be determined prior to the drop. Will it just be a vote?

[Agent CraZy DiP]

It will be determined by the people that have the command module installed on their mech.