Clan Warfare vs Solaris Gameplay

Still think Solaris would have put them in a better place 11ity times more than CW. Think of all the tournaments and leaderboards that Solaris would support compared to who knows what battles on 2 maps with respawns.

Wow, I get to fight for a random planet, possibly grouped with moron pugs for 25 minutes for a forum title/badge? Wow. Totally inspires more than seeing my name go up on leaderboards, playing specialized tournaments, betting cbills on matches, even handicapping mechs for certain Elo threshholds (think the amazing gladiator vs X retarded newbies (ie lions or criminals), etc.

 

That's why you have a "I don't care about anything" picture though.... For people wanting to help their faction it gives them something to fight for.

Soalris 1v1 would just be rock, paper, scissors in a handful of mechs.

 

the Solaris games were always just a small part of the bigger universe of battle tech. i would like to see it but only as a part of the main game not the game. there are so many facets of the BT universe, which ones do they work on??

 

Honestly, this is a monumentally stupid comment. I don't know where to start so I'll just say, Lt my friend, you are wrong.

 

I definitely don't play this game like other people play it and I'm in the minority with my opinion. Maybe that's part of the reason I stuck around playing and paying over years instead of just visiting a messageboard from time to time.

 

Don't you get it???

Without CW, this is playing the game. Cuz there's nothing else to do when you've killed everyone and made better builds a month before the rest do.

 

It's silly to think this game can be all things to all people. In your completely valid opinion, I'm totally wrong to want Solaris to be a focus and I completely understand it. You want a 'reason' to fight for something and go balls out to kill/crush/destroy with more BT/mechwarrior lore.

I'm not convinced pgi's vision of 2D planets on a map changing color is a reason for my playing. You're right that any CW is better than deathmatch that we have today, but if those resources were put into solaris:
- comp-minded people have a very similar reason to clear the table with their skills. Instead of planets changing color, you have a very real demonstration of your uberness in various leaderboards. You can still find the best build or shift the builds/tactics to your heart's content.
- people like me that aren't competitive are given an outlet to run non-tier 1 builds in an environment that isn't just deathmatch over and over by getting in different 'leagues' or allowable builds just like what a lot of the 3rd party leagues are doing now with 4v4, 8v8, different drop rules, etc.

Everything that pgi has said about CW is ho-hum to me. Dropship mode and real attack/defend maps can all be PART of solaris and they can even create a backstory for each drop about a historical battle and you have to meet the criteria to play in it.

Once a real solaris framework is in place, soooo much more can be added monthly. But no. CW will be the same exact shit with a few more maps thrown in over time and some changing colors on a faction map. I don't get it apparently.

 

Just to throw out the other side (which I'm sure you have heard before), Lt... I see no appeal to Solaris. It's a glorified death match. You may have just come the closest to selling me on it by explaining the variations, but then you shot yourself in the foot by explaining that people are already doing it with private matches. All an organized Solaris would add is a slightly improved ease if access and a leaderboard. I don't see the point of leaderboards.

CW adds (in the base form): more game modes and the idea of objectives. Both of these things can be added to and modified over time. Advantages/disadvantages to holding certain planets, new win conditions, multipart missions, objectives for smaller groups. All this can be added. All of this can be incorporated into your ad hoc private tournaments as well. CW adds functionality. Solaris adds a leaderboard.

 

what are planets changing color besides a more broad and generic leaderboard for what house you're in? And really, I don't care at all about the leaderboard aspect of my dream solaris, I care about creating a framework to allow for individualized matches (either solo matches, best of series, or have them combine to a 1-2 week tournament which is what they're sorta doing with token wins in CW).

Instead of our CW, where people are already planning on what T1 mechs they will bring to meet the hard 240 ton limit for each and every fucking game, create reasons to play other mechs as well. Your name or group on a leaderboard is only to appease those clans/groups that play together. I'd be way more interested in hopping on on a Tuesday night and seeing - Welcome to the Solaris Arena!! Battle of XYZ is about to start. 2 Rasalhauge med/heavy lances were patrolling viridian bog when they're attacked by 3 lances of lower tonnage and ill-repaired pirates from the periphery! Who will you fight for?!?!
Requirements to play for Rasalhague are X & Y. Pirate band requirements are light/med mechs of these type only: A, B...E.
On top of your usual match earnings, Pirate win gets a match bonus of X Cbills, Rasalhague gets a bonus of ...whatever. Just keep it so an even-ish number of people play both sides.

Once the framework is built to apply different rules and match rewards on the fly for events and the checks in place to qualify to play in a match, they could build a SHIT TON of lore scenarios; even get the community on board by creating their own backstory/team requirements and voting on them or pgi just taking the suggestions. Hundreds of fucking reasons to play a certain way that can incorporate houses/mercs/different mechs, etc.

No, we get colors changing on a 1996 map. That's CW?

Maybe the problem is pre-conceived notions of Solaris and that's probably my fault for just saying 'solaris mode' which has been talked about in the past as just a leaderboard system. I would want something way different.

 

The problem with 3rd party tournaments/matches is that you generally need to already be part of a group and explicitly enter in to playing them so you get set match times. The beauty of pgi doing it is that they have the randoms to pull from at any given time. Plus, while we sit there for 3 minutes to find a match and 45 seconds at the ready screen, you can have some text blurb or random image loads to occupy your time.

 

Do you realize that what you just described is a modified version of their original call to arms idea? Just with modified lance requirements? The CW framework needs to come first - then all of these modes, whether you want to call them Solaris or multicolor 2D map epeen can follow.

 

It's quite a bit different than PGI's call to arms as there doesn't have to be an attacking side and it's not so focused on grouped/clan play; and certainly doesn't have some arbitrary mechanic of winning X times to get enough tokens - it would start just like any match today, just instead of random drops, you'd self-select what side to join based on the criteria (or be preselected based on your house affiliation depending on the game type/mode).

Sure, if CW morphs into actually having a story with it or something more than just 240 ton individual dropship mode, sounds good to me. I see the likelihood of that happening coming in at 0.2%.

 

Good reply, Lt. I'll edit this post to a real response when I finish dinner in a few minutes and have my thoughts in order.

edit:

MechWarrior cannot and will not ever be a game for everyone. Conversely, a game should moreso strive to be what it truly is to everyone, rather than BSing its way thru its crowd. Chess is Chess to everyone, it's not chess to some and fucking patty-cake to others. A quality game that is balanced, timeless, and engaging needs to have some sort of identity.

Step back from MWO for a sec and really look at the game as objectively as possible. What the fuck about it stands out among a crowd of inconveniently niche-peaking robot beat-em-ups. Nothing. What is the one thing about BT/MW that stands out, at least historically? The fucking depth and scope of it all. It's not the Mad Cat. It's not the PPC. It's not House Homo. It's all of that shit combined, and built upon, for years and years. Fleshed out in opaque terms in the novels and games and stanky hobby shops/basements over the past decades, with blanks filled in by our imaginations and own experiences. CW is the only thing that is going to be able to make the game stand out, because it's that breadth itself that makes your eyes widen about BT/MW.

Look at the game objectively and tell me that it's anything more than a deathmatch that fringes on twitch play rather than large scale, interactive, tactical battles.

Solaris is great, it's a part of the lore and universe. It should exist within CW as a neutral planet that people can do duelish stuff with. Possibly for money, leaderboard, whatever. Speaking of leaderboard, CW is not about a leaderboard. It's not. Leaderboards were about leaderboards. I was competitive, but leaderboards/tournies were times when we were actually able to showcase individuality. Otherwise, in the serious matches, it's about the team... even if your actions in those matches sometimes require selfish or rogue play at times. Anyways, point is, Solaris should be about auxiliary shit. Cuz that's literally what it is in terms of canon.

The game could use Solaris for some arbitrary fun stuff but it's all very auxiliary and basically contrite in terms of the bigger picture. They need to focus on bigger picture.

 

I get this, but I still don't see how PGI's CW, as stated in all their command chair posts, brings you interactive or tactical. Maybe we'll be surprised. Interactive would be giving the player base a choice in picking to attack one planet over another; stationing defensive battalions on planets... all the single player type gameplay stuff we all know. The only thing I can even recall that PGI said they would have as a reason to attack one planet or another was something like mech or weapon facilities would allow you to buy less expensive equipment or mechs that are outside of that houses usual stable - and they've already scratched that (or put it on a long-term hold).

There will be a bit more tactics involved and new ones developed with the addition of dropship and whatever these gates are going to be for attack/defend. However, the smart players like yourself and the others in your same boat will figure it out and then it trickles down to everyone else to copy as best they can. 2 months later? It's now the same shit as what we have now, just longer matches (and the opportunity for match imbalances to take 25 minutes instead of 5-7 minutes; can you imagine the number of pugs/casuals that will just be like 'f this' and disco half way through from getting stomped if they don't like it?)

The funny thing about that image is that 2/3's of those players don't play any more. This proves the point we need something else; but I expect a mass exodus after 2 months of CW because people that were holding out for the experience you want just won't be there. Also, I know the tournament winners are good players and do very well in real games, but let's be honest, a lot of that was from how many matches you could play in a weekend to find that perfect game of player composition and map positioning. We'll see if CW raises the level of gameplay for the average players (comp-minded or not) or if it causes them to opt out and now we shrunk our already small player base or split them further. I think PGI worries about this as well since CW will start off very slowly (what was it, one night a week?). Seems to me, the group queue will just move to CW and the solo queue stays the same. A lot of effort on PGI's part for up-in-the-air to questionable results.

 

It doesn't get you close enough to interaction and tactics by itself, you're right. But it does get you close enough that if you involve yourself in meta in terms of social dynamics, and use your imagination a bit, then it's at least passable as some of reflection of the machinations of a galaxy churning and robots stomping and houses at war and clans invading.

If you were a top competitive player that participated in tournies you had to timesink longer most likely, because of ELO, whereas a lot of randoms would have a better chance at stringing together a few rounds in a row ala tryhard instead of chillmoding as normal. That's one of the perks of playing casually, you can actually play the game while sitting back and eating cheetos. Just sayin.

I think PGI have to risk it and go for broke, man. I'd take questionable results over complete failure to deliver on it at all and just make the game for dueling or ad hoc fights.

 

Also...

I think, in retrospect, that they made a grave error by not consistently ramping up the lore output. Remember the daily Lore posts on the site back in early beta? HPG alerts or something, whatever, at least it was someone actually thinking creatively towards the community... on a daily basis... even if it was just a blurb... =/

Something, anything... I mean, you ever notice that their reveals for mechs and stuff come across like fucking car commercials? Where is the actual fluff.

All this talk just makes me want to play a MC again.

 

Solaris would rock!

 

Ok Soy said everything I wanted to say so no point in me rehashing things, but for me Solaris Leaderboards is aimed at solo/small group glory and I just prefer team glory. I get the attraction of Solaris because I pug and push hard but playing with friends is my main goal with FPS and MMO's. Its why Aylek/Dudes club or Falconium/UMAD get random convoes if my unit are all awol and I plan to be on for a decent amount of time. Ok a few others...

In fairness I would like a Solaris angle added to replace the tournaments (not the competitions as I like those as they give you a different type of goal) as those reward who can put in 72 hrs awake sacrificing your team and the max number of matches rather than an exceptional performance or multiple exceptional performances over time.

Suppose my ideal setup would be:

CW for team/faction based side,
Solaris for individual epeen,
Competitions for a changing goal in solo/team,
Pug/Solo for relaxed normal play.

I've just never seen them as mutually exclusive which is the focus of this thread.

Agreed Soy I always felt it was a tragic mistake stopping the lore broadcasts and am praying they start it again once the timeline restarts with CW.