MWO Faction Play / Storymodus: first impressions

Started by Onai "Oni" Tekimata, 23.05.2019 07:32

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Onai "Oni" Tekimata

Here the summary from the patch notes:

Faction Play Update:

Games will now be driving Conflicts which take place in Faction Play.
There will be story lines which play out over the course of a Conflict in a series of Phases. Similar to a Faction Play Event, Conflicts make up of mini-events which are called Phases and in each Conflict, there are multiple Phases.
Once a Conflict completes, the story arc ends and resolves the Conflict for a planet switch or story foretelling.

Conflict System summary:
Conflicts are completed via Phases.
Players can go to the 'Conflict Selection" screen to select a Freelancer/Mercenary/Loyalist role and join one of the two Factions in that Conflict or can click on a Call-To-Arms to join one.
A Conflict can be any one of 4 pre-determined map states (3050, 3052, 3057 or 3062)
Each Phase will contain an unfolding story, while also stating the duration, game mode and success condition.
The outcome of a story in the first Phase will affect the subsequent one.
Overall story of a current Conflict can be found under the 'Conflict' and 'Mission' tabs in the 'Conflicts Panel' on the Inner Sphere Map.
A 'War History' screen can be viewed at the end of a Conflict to review it's results.

There will be a set amount of time where players enter the queue and the Match Maker holds the match creation until the timer expires. This creates one big queue of grouped and solo players combined. Once the hold timer expires, the Match Maker starts to create matches by pulling the biggest groups against each other from largest to smallest until it has exhausted all of the groups in queue. Odd sized teams are then filled with solo players based on a zero sum ELO from highest to lowest. Once this is complete, all of the matches are released to the dedicated game servers and the hold timer is started once again.

Match Maker summary:
The queues and matchmaker have been replaced with a new single queue and matchmaker for both group and solo players.
Matches kick-off every two minutes.

End-of-match rewards:
Freelancers receive a 5% XP boost for every match they play.
Mercenaries receive a 5% C-Bill boost for every match they play.
Loyalists continue earning Loyalty Points (LP) for loyalist titles and rewards. (Note: Additional functionality will be added towards Loyalty Points in a future patch)

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Now Onais three C-bills to this:
I tried yesterday and it did not work at all from IS side. Errors popped up as we tried to play in group and as single players. On clan side at least you got in the Q but there was more claners then IS-players (2:1, to even 5:1) and as far as I heard Scouting matches could be played. So my first impression is, that it needs basic improvement.
At least the "story" behind the event gives a little depth, but as it is for some reason unable to play, well....

What are your opinions and impressions (except IS large machine gun builds are OP  :mrgreen:)

Chu-sa Onai Tekimata, Web: 36th Dieron Regulars, Facebook: 36th Dieron Regulars DCMS
"wisdom is your best weapon"

Hatake "Storyteller" Matsumura

Can't tell much more. Played one scouting matchs with my Clan Smurf Account vs IS and ran into 4 Bushwackers... Our PUG, a Stromcrow, wandered off alone got killed immidiatly. And even though we had three very experienced players on our own (Roughneck, Grafstrat and me), we managed to down only 1 of the Wackers, before they took us all out.

And yes, there were many more Clanners in the queue than Spherelings.

Rai "StarBlaze" Akahoshi

"[...] Mechwarriors who don't care about Winning or Losing, they just live for the Fighting." - Heir Apparent by Michael A. Stackpole

Hachirou "Phidias86" Girisha

INFO:
They messed up the different tonnage-regulations between IS and CLAN. If you choose a drop deck with 250 or less tonnage you can enter the queue on side of the IS. If you have 265 t, you can't.

My guess is, that they missed this aspect or that it is not as easy as it sounds, because now you can choose your side in every conflict and don't have a "standard-tonnage-limitation".

Attention: The tonnage-limitation in the dropdeck-manager does not show any conflicts, but they do apply: 265 or 260 t dropdeck - not able to enter the queue vs. 250 t or lower - able to do so.

Onai "Oni" Tekimata

<250t only for getting in the Q. In the match <265t is allowed....

Chu-sa Onai Tekimata, Web: 36th Dieron Regulars, Facebook: 36th Dieron Regulars DCMS
"wisdom is your best weapon"

Onai "Oni" Tekimata


Chu-sa Onai Tekimata, Web: 36th Dieron Regulars, Facebook: 36th Dieron Regulars DCMS
"wisdom is your best weapon"