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The simplest, most reasonable way to achieve player balance in the MV |
doda *EP5 no longer exception...*
Grand Admiral
Joined: December 11, 2005
Posts: 1012
From: happy land
|  Posted: 2011-01-25 14:10
But what happens when players dont get to use their upgraded ships due to balance.
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Brundon
Admiral
Joined: December 09, 2009
Posts: 25
From: Florida
| Posted: 2011-01-25 14:34
The thing about this is, this would force people to choose a faction. If you're fleetless, and like being fleetless. That leaves those people out. I don't like this idea. This is a big "Oh you're fleetless so we'll just leave you out of the game because you're lower than us.". Yes that's very simple, Indeed.
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Enterprise
Chief Marshal
Joined: May 19, 2002
Posts: 2576
From: Hawthorne, Nevada
| Posted: 2011-01-25 15:32
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On 2011-01-25 14:34, Incendio wrote:
The thing about this is, this would force people to choose a faction. If you're fleetless, and like being fleetless. That leaves those people out. I don't like this idea. This is a big "Oh you're fleetless so we'll just leave you out of the game because you're lower than us.". Yes that's very simple, Indeed.
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It doesn't leave those people out. It forces those people to make a decision. Being fleetless shouldn't be a free ride to play whichever side you feel like in a persistent map. I don't doubt if the NPC factions actually had a voice, they would have QQ'd a long time ago about those damn fleetless traitors that they always seem to let back on when they happen to be winning.
You can either pick a faction if you really like it, and stick with it. Or you can always have at least two factions to choose from, but not the one with the most players on it.
Sounds like a balanced decision to me. Otherwise, why bother joining a fleet? Seems like they kind of get left out to me. They have to live with their decisions. The fleetless don't. Thats kind of a raw deal isn't it?
Its funny that last sentence of yours. That whole "we're better than you" attitude, is kind of the reverse. Since the fleetless can always leave a faction hanging when its doing bad, switch to the other side and hammer on. The ones in the fleet have to live with losing. They have to pay the penalty, why don't you? Why does not being a fleet make you better than them?
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On 2011-01-25 14:10, doda *EP5 no longer exception...* wrote:
But what happens when players dont get to use their upgraded ships due to balance.
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You only play one faction then?
Lock yourself to it, get a guaranteed spot.
Otherwise you probably have upgraded ships on other factions that you play right? Well you get to use them then. I know I do.
-Ent
[ This Message was edited by: Saint Valentine on 2011-01-25 15:33 ]
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SpaceAdmiral
Grand Admiral
Joined: May 05, 2010
Posts: 1005
| Posted: 2011-01-25 17:48
How to beat this system:
Fleetless hoppers sees ICC is winning.
But ICC has most players.
Fleetless hoppers lock into ICC.
Since all hoppers are locked into ICC for a week, ICC dominate for a week.
vs
The current one faction dominates for maybe 4 hours, then this faction, etc.
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Reznor
Marshal
Joined: March 29, 2010
Posts: 316
| Posted: 2011-01-25 21:27
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On 2011-01-25 17:48, SpaceAdmiral wrote:
How to beat this system:
Fleetless hoppers sees ICC is winning.
But ICC has most players.
Fleetless hoppers lock into ICC.
Since all hoppers are locked into ICC for a week, ICC dominate for a week.
vs
The current one faction dominates for maybe 4 hours, then this faction, etc.
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Love this post  . Good thinking.
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Okkam
Marshal
Joined: February 06, 2008
Posts: 157
From: Dorset
| Posted: 2011-01-25 21:45
I'm all for the auto-teams.
Consider first person shooters, the game genre would really suck and fail to compete if they didn't have the autobalance function atleast available.
I like the idea of having the auto-fleet function as a fleetless person myself. I know how to fly most of the ships in all 3 races and own a few in each.
From my point of view the only ones who wouldn't like it would be those with a full hangar of one fleet (Although this would be covered from the orriginal post by joining a fleet) and to be put on the same time as people I dislike or cannot work properly with. (To name no names, you know who you are).
That being said, the last point can be overruled just by choosing the 2nd fleet option.
I vote for this, if only to stop the 7+ krill fleets vs 2 icc stations and a combat dread.... made me rage so much
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Enterprise
Chief Marshal
Joined: May 19, 2002
Posts: 2576
From: Hawthorne, Nevada
| Posted: 2011-01-26 01:32
Quote:
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On 2011-01-25 21:27, Reznor wrote:
Quote:
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On 2011-01-25 17:48, SpaceAdmiral wrote:
How to beat this system:
Fleetless hoppers sees ICC is winning.
But ICC has most players.
Fleetless hoppers lock into ICC.
Since all hoppers are locked into ICC for a week, ICC dominate for a week.
vs
The current one faction dominates for maybe 4 hours, then this faction, etc.
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Love this post . Good thinking.
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Me too! I think its excellent thinking, and probably the first constructive damn post.
However, it illustrates a point that I think should be addressed in its entirety.
Firstly, this assumes that all fleetless "hoppers" decide to lock into that faction. The game, from newbies to vets, is most comprised of fleetless players, so I think the idea of every single one of them locking into a single faction at any given point for seven days is highly improbable, but not beyond the realm of possibility.
However, I also still think its a better way than now. Why?
Because if they do it, for one, they're stuck with that faction for the next seven days. They chose to make a commitment, now they're stuck with it for better or worse. They can't just leave the faction the moment its losing, and they also can't go and join other factions when theirs happens to be dead. It makes them committted.
This is probably why I think in itself, would keep most faction hoppers from doing this. No matter who is dominating now, like you said, four hours laters, it might not be the same deal. There will always be other fleetless players that are playing on other factions including those factions main fleets. To me, being fleetless is a kind of indvidualism that I think would make people seriously consider whether the winning side now will be the winning side later.
Fleetless do make up what swings the battle for *the moment*. But as you say, four hours later, maybe its another faction. The point I'm trying to demonstrate that even though I would still find it better if fleetless players actually threw in that committment for seven days rather than constantly hopping, its still unlikely given the sheer volume of fleetless players that they all would give up their "freedom of choice" just to join the faction that happens to be winning at the moment.
Its a good point, I just don't see very many players doing it. A week is a long time. You have fleetless players that stay fleetless so they can move to the winning side at a moments notice. Then you have fleetless players who stay fleetless because they have variety. I think its a situation that would correct itself after the fleetless players that lock themselves to a factoin that happens to be winning at the moment when it sinks in when they start losing they just can't switch factions.
Or perhaps I just don't realistically see people locking themselves to a faction because its winning at the moment, because then you're betting its going to win for the next seven days. You're betting that all the people who locked to it play at the same time, you're betting that they're not just all going to log the moment you start losing. Thats alot of bets. In the end I think people would use it more to make sure they play the faction they love without having to join a fleet than as a tool to make sure they're on the winning side.
Or, we could just cut that idea out, and force fleetless players to choose a fleet if they want to be on a faction for sure, which pretty much circumvents what you're trying to point out. It was just something thrown in there to give players more choice, but if you think it might be abused that much, then it illustrates my point as to why fleetless players need to be balanced in the MV.
-Ent
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tucker32
Fleet Admiral
Joined: February 16, 2009
Posts: 141
From: deep jungle of vargo
| Posted: 2011-01-26 02:10
well then why not just lock a player to a certain faction for what say 8-10 hours at this time somone could log off for 5-10 minutes come back on switch to another faction what we need is a time lock to the point in which we logged in to the time the time limit end beofre we switch fleets bcuz if u choose a faction in the beginning and soon see u'll get steam rolled if u stay on this faction a hour or 2 later then that person can't just switch at a whim they have to wait for a certain time to be over that way faction hopping is eliminated from happening almost completely so no "blobs" can be formed and players can play their favorite faction without worrying that they can't use their favorite ships and arn't forced to be in a certain faction because of autobalancing
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Sops
Marshal
Galactic Navy
Joined: March 07, 2004
Posts: 490
| Posted: 2011-01-26 10:04
This suggestion may abate imbalance to some degree but it doesn't fix it. Major imbalance can still occur by a large number of faction locked players logging on at the same time either by chance or by design. And players can still faction hop by having multiple accounts, while they are slowing bring down pres gain it still does not take very long to rank up an alt account.
It seems like some people just hate faction hoppers and any gain in team balance is just an added bonus. It is fine to think that just don't misrepresent yourself.
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Lark of Serenity
Grand Admiral
Raven Warriors
Joined: June 02, 2002
Posts: 2516
| Posted: 2011-01-26 10:43
i think weve identified the following problems:
A) faction hoppers regularly ditch the losing faction to join the winning one, exacerbating existing player imbalances
B) even with a faction lock and fleetless player autobalance, we are left with the possibility of a large number of locked players logging in at once and simply overwhelming another side.
to boil this down to basics:
A) we allow too much choice and leeway for people to switch to the winning side. there is no cap on someone switching factions X number of times in Y amount of time, no extended spawn wait period for doing so, no handicap for doing so, etc.
B) we lack a system that, as stated earlier, dynamically balances by giving buffs or handicaps depending on player numbers. this is somewhat alleviated by AI vessels but not especially.
to address these things, we need to
A) find a way to discourage people from faction hopping (clears your garage? costs credits? costs prestige? your account has different ranks depending on which faction your on (similar to class unlocks in battlefield. playing the medic class gets you medic weapons and global unlocks but not unlocks in other classes. playing kluth gets you kluth and global unlocks but not anythign else?)?
and
B) find a way to improve dynamic balancing. a simple bandaid solution would to be to dramatically increase the number of AI dreadnaughts that spawn for the low-population faction. they wouldnt be smart but the addition of pure firepower might balance things out. another would be a damage and repair buff to the low-population faction or similar or complementary handicap to the over-populated faction. another possibility would be all ship upgrades deactiviating for the highest-populated faction.
etc. etc.
any other suggestions?
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Chewy Squirrel
Chief Marshal
Joined: January 27, 2003
Posts: 304
From: NYC
| Posted: 2011-01-26 11:02
How about having a certain optional "faction" that players can opt into that always gets them assigned to the lowest population faction. These mercenaries would be forced to always join the underpopulated faction. Once a player opts into being a mercenary they cannot opt out for an extended period of time, say maybe a month.
An opt in system of auto-balance would be met with much less resistance and QQ than a blanket forced auto-balance.
Of course there would have to be incentives in order for anybody to opt into being a mercenary. A few options: A 10% bonus to prestige, additional garage slots(to account for the fact that they can get assigned to any of the 3 factions), Higher enchancement drop rate, lower enchancement degradation on death, 10% increase to firepower.
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The Fridge
Chief Marshal
Templar Knights
Joined: December 13, 2008
Posts: 559
From: In Your Fridge, Eating your Foods.
| Posted: 2011-01-26 11:13
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On 2011-01-26 11:02, Chewy Squirrel {om nom nom nom nom} wrote:
How about having a certain optional "faction" that players can opt into that always gets them assigned to the lowest population faction. These mercenaries would be forced to always join the underpopulated faction. Once a player opts into being a mercenary they cannot opt out for an extended period of time, say maybe a month.
An opt in system of auto-balance would be met with much less resistance and QQ than a blanket forced auto-balance.
Of course there would have to be incentives in order for anybody to opt into being a mercenary. A few options: A 10% bonus to prestige, additional garage slots(to account for the fact that they can get assigned to any of the 3 factions), Higher enchancement drop rate, lower enchancement degradation on death, 10% increase to firepower.
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| Option to choose to go Factionless for 3 Months.
Reward: 10% more prestige gain in suppying/building/bombing/capping
5% more in Combat.
You get the idea, Feel free to shoot it down as hard as you like.
The bonus might increase if you join the lowest populated faction.
Bonus decreases to zero if the faction becomes 1st in population.
And also decreases if your in the 2nd most populated which starts to rise closer to the 1st.
If in 3rd, depending on how populated it is will decrease as it gets closer to 1st.
P.s. The numbers have no actual meaning. And i've probably explained it badly
[ This Message was edited by: The Fridge on 2011-01-22 14:24 ]
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Balancept
Grand Admiral
Joined: September 09, 2010
Posts: 31
From: Somewhere
| Posted: 2011-01-26 12:15
Truthfully, I like the opt in "mercenary" feature idea, and since I am fleetless, I would pry do that anyway, except my garage is full of enhanced luth ships that I don't want to get rid of.
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tucker32
Fleet Admiral
Joined: February 16, 2009
Posts: 141
From: deep jungle of vargo
| Posted: 2011-01-26 12:24
i like mercenary idea too i mean why should u suffer trying to fight more players just bcuz other players are more numerous in a faction but what about siging up for just a week rather than a month? month is too long
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Balancept
Grand Admiral
Joined: September 09, 2010
Posts: 31
From: Somewhere
| Posted: 2011-01-26 12:53
idk, month might be too long, but it is always a laugh to grab a small, fast ship, then laugh as mobs of people try to kill you and rarely suceed.
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