f13.net forums - Launch Party Tournament and Community Warfare reveal

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April 19, 2024, 09:14:16 PM

we're back, baby

Tonight, 2pm PDT / 9pm GMT, the first post-launch Tournament of MechWarrior Online is gonna take place in San Francisco.

The whole thing is gonna be streamed live on Twitch ---> at this link <---

The teams have been formed based on applications, and then randomly drawn, so it's not like we are gonna see (as far as I know) awesomely organized units like DV8 or HBA, but they had a week to prepare and practice together so there's a chance for some interesting matches. Another interesting note is that this is the first time they enforce any kind of weight class limitation, as each Company will be forced to field 3 Lights, 3 Mediums, 3 Heavies and 3 Assaults.

But what everyone is really looking forward to is the much anticipated reveal of Community Warfare (it is NOT gonna be live for many months yet, they are merely revealing what it is gonna be like and how it is gonna work). This will take place at 7pm PDT / 2am GMT.

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EVENT SCHEDULE - SEPT 26TH (TIMES SHOWN ARE PDT)

2:00pm Invitational Tournament Round 1

5:00pm Invitational Tournament Round 2

7:00pm Presentations + Door Prizes

7:30pm The Special Match (name to be finalized)

8:00pm Semi Finals

9:00pm Grand Final

9:30pm Awards
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Ah! yes. More weight caps, please.

It bothers me that the weight classes are in alphabetical rather than weight order. Of course that' just my own OCD.

I really hope they have someone who knows what's going on (and can relay that in a clear and interesting way) commenting the matches for the stream. Otherwise it's going to be boring to watch.

Some preliminary pictures from the event (starting in two hours). The guy with the book is Randall Bills, BattleTech's novels author and responsible for the development of the tabletop since 2000 or so. Hit tshirt..... looks like the blueprint of the new Battlemaster. Want.

IGP proves to be up to the task once again, currently the start of the live stream is to be delayed 45 minutes (so hopefully in 30 mins but I'm not holding my breath) Ohhhhh, I see.

Uhm, official start time of the live stream is 40 minutes from now if it respects the schedule. Are you saying it is gonna start 45 minutes after the scheduled time, which means about 80 minutes from now?

EDIT: Looks like the stream starts in 20 minutes and the tournament starts in 35 minutes. As planned. Not sure what kind of a mess they created. Maybe they don't understand their own timezone.

According to MWO's own event page: Join us on September 26, 2013 at 1pm PDT onward for the livestream at http://twitch.tv/MechWarrior
currently on twitch: Igp: Update: The livestream begins @ 1:45PM PDT (Pacific) or 4:45PM EDT (Eastern). The livestream will begin in 15 minutes. The time is now 1:30PM PDT. The tournament will begin at 2PM PDT.

Seems to me pretty clear that the live stream is 45mins late or they just really suck at communication

Look at the picture at the top of the page.

The EVENT started at 1pm, but the stream was always supposed to start at 2pm, as you can see in the opening picture of this thread. But yes, that bit you quoted is definitely misleading.

... but yeah, in perfect PGI style, the event started and nothing works. Audio comes and goes, some people are muted, and so far it all pretty much looks like a giant mess. Let's see how it evolves, but seeing Daeron trying to talk after he got a backup microphone that STILL doesn't work is pretty pathetic.

First tournament match starting in 5 minutes.

Community Warfare revealed: it is basically EVE (minus PvE, minus open world, minus real economy. Ok it is not EVE at all). Player Corps can own planets and build bases on it. They also have to play "logistics" in order to move dropships and 'mechs around (over real life days) the galaxy to attack wherever they want to attack. There is so much more but I am sure someone will come up with a compiled list. There is supposedly gonna be room for "player created content" in the form of bounties players can put on specific players or corps.

All I can say is that it sounds so good... that I really don't think they can pull it off.

Here's the full 28 minutes so you can see for yourself.

EDIT: A decent bullet point recap.

Quote

Concentrating on 3 "Lives" - Mercenary (Lone Wolf) Loyalist (Faction) Unit Life (Merc Units)

Mercenary: No official assoc with any faction, works for himself, earns prestige through contracts
Loyalist: Pledged to a House/Faction, Employed by that faction, Grains prestige by earning loyalty points and ranking up within a faction
Unit Life: Agreed to work with others in a structured organization, Is employed by a Merc Corp, Gains prestige through team work and successful group contracts

CONTRACTS:
Non-Faction Players and Merc Corps can accept contracts on behalf of a specific faction
Have conditions for successful comp
result in rewards
take as many contracts as they want
failure to complete a contract may impact future standings

TYPES OF CONTRACTS include Planetary Assault (skirmish, bounty = which are player created!!! - for cbills?)

LOYALTY POINTS earned by performing feats against opposing factions, benefits and perks, unlocks access to content - fill a bar for a faction, get rewards/content including skins, famous units, etc.
- performance based like XP / CBills

(lost some stuff here, will try to add later - MERC and FACTION units, exclusive rewards, ability to join exclusive units - Wolf Dragoons, etc.)

MERC and FACTION:
Faction Unit combat, get their own private channel can communicate prior to battles

Merc Unit combat join public fight or faction fights
Can own dropships move stuff around
time to travel through space via JumpShip to the planet you want to attack
(whole thing reminds me a bit of Star Wars RTS game)

PLANETARY ASSAULT
Travel through space, Get a contract through planet, Must garrison after fighting for control (not sure how that works, just know that you "need to garrison" after winning)

FACTION WARFARE
Fight for home/enemy fronts, fronts flip when 100% of planets are controlled by a faction
Every match will affect state of universe (think RISK...each battle is actually fought in a match)

INNERSPHERE
Mechs can be bought of black market, economy reflects what you control / have access to
CW ECONOMICS
Pricing will vary based on faction relationships, mechs produced in your area will be easier to attain, otherwise need to be purchased on the black market

PHASES:
Phase 1 - leveling system (max level 60 as of now), represented as a unit
Phase 2 - faction play, pub play, every match affects universe - dropship, select from 4 maps, preconfig lances, vote on maps (pre lobby)
Phase 3 - Planetary Assault - capturing planets -
Six months to roll out, Phase 1 really soon after UI 2.0

TO COME:
UI 2.0 running, framework up, demonstrated - rotate mechs in any view, sort, drop down filters, looks nice!
Want to get to public test ASAP, just a few things to get ready, within next 4 weeks
Working on unified API to bring in loadouts from outside the game (web, mobile, probably)
UI Scales to desktop, even across different monitors (triple configs)

God help me that actually sounds .....good?

It sounds awesome. The thing is, while he was talking, it totally all sounded years away. He even let a few "we are still designing this" slip out. And if you think about it, it is pretty much exactly what he promised twentyone months ago, in December 2011.

So yes, it could be good, but we are not gonna see that anytime soon.

Well, at least the UI looks nifty. It's at the end of the video I posted above. The 'mechs look good in it.

EDIT: If anyone is curious, here is the new map coming next Tuesday: Crimson Strait.

All that CW stuff sounds good... and like it will be (mostly) in game in the distant future.

For the line member, all of that translates to...

Some mechs will change price or availability based on your faction and magic.

There will be standings grinds.

A Web page will tell you if your side is winning.

Its not that there is anything wrong with it, just that this sort of thing never turns out to be a big deal in a symmetric sport pvp game unless you are part of a largish organised and competitive group who likes to break systems

I think that is fairly accurate Eldaec. And as you said yourself it is not that bad anyway for the casual player. At some point, no matter how good and fun a game is, it keeps a bit of repetition at bay to have a few little growing numbers to look at and some carrots to chase, even if they are nothing more than a title, an achievement, or a skin for your 'mech.

The map, though, I am pretty sure it will be in the client and not on a website. I also like that, supposedly, even for random PUGgers, everh match will still be part of the Community Warfare (as factionless players will be used as merfenaries to fill up faction matches in need of more players) as opposed to World of Tanks or Warthunder where a random match exists in a void.

Here, according to what they said, every single match (except private server ones) will be automatically part of the conflict and will contribute to it.

If you missed (you did) the Launch Tournament, I decided to record the final match for you. It ended up being quite epic after five minutes of meaningless ridge battling.

Here it is, and if you think it's boring just fast forward to 5:50 when the serious action starts.

Seriously, if you are into this, definitely a must watch. Too bad video quality is not that great and the "spectator camera" could really use some colour markers.

There was a girl in the winning team (B B Wolfe) who happened to be the only one person using a Joystick (her own) in the whole tournament. And she scored three kills, more than anyone else, with that joystick in the final.

hot dang that was CLOSE.

Insane. Half a second and it would have been over. Also, that Raven could have physically "blocked" the Cent from getting in to gain that precious half second instead of just standing there, but I guess it's easy to say so from here.