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Thread: 4 Months of Whoever Grabs the Officer First...

  1. #61
    WoR-Dev GeorgeCrecy's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Poorlaggedman View Post
    It's seldom even in the ballpark of fun walking into a server and playing with zero input on to something as mind-numbingly critical as "let's not have Joe the idiot run the team who's asking us basic gameplay functions or lacks an idea of what 'final push' is." Oh, we don't have to follow them. What the hell else are we supposed to do? The roles are in the game and accentuated now by multiple perks....
    Hey there PLM,
    We do appreciate your input and the input of others. Given our involvement in the community so far, we would have hoped to have garnered a better score than not being considered as transparent as a development team can reasonably be. On the other hand, I would suggest it would be all the worse for the community were we to showcase any more than what we deem as ready, both in the case of trying to ensure quality as well as not inflate expectations with the accompanying disappointment should it not work out.
    In speaking of which let me also address the meat of your post here, primarily in regards to the suggestions regarding gameplay. It's great to have someone with your wide ranging perspective born from many years in wargaming simulations, as you have a lot of examples to pull from. I would say though that contrary to your assumption that the fundamental changes you had been suggesting all stem from a lack of ambition. I might suggest otherwise, that one of the primary reasons for lack of change would also stem from technological walls.
    For instance, one of the early ideas for us thrown around was formation locking, given that in a game you don't have the same peripheral vision and sense of touch necessary to keep in line. The problem lies in not just the boringness of locking into place for the win without much further action necessary, but the biggest roadblock came from the tech side of server to client latency. That little cookie is one all multiplayer developers fight constantly with, as much as gamers suffer from it. What happens if a person lags or crashes? How does that break the formation for everyone else?
    We aren't trying to ignore anyone, and certainly not trying to thumb our noses at anyone. So while we deal with the growing fits of the development process, and as we throw ideas around for new and existing systems, know that we are watching the forums and listening to your concerns, and will do the best that our limited team can do. Thanks! And as always, keep the suggestions and questions coming!

  2. #62
    By not having input I mean inside the gameplay itself. Nobody has input as to who their officer is. I would never run any sort of event or organized gameplay like that. I would never start a game and say "Oh John Snuffy picked officer. Well, I guess we have to follow him." That's crazy. That's what the OP is going on about. We can have that game and play that game but it's going to suck outside of well-ran events where we sidestep those issues. Good events take time and effort which would still always be far better anyway if the game addressed those questions. I've got plenty of hours of sucky gameplay footage, some of good, but long squalls of suck.

    The officers have an enormous influence on that, essentially being the minds of the team. People are sometimes willing to surrender control like that online... when I watch a Youtube video I don't expect to have an ounce of control over what I'm watching unless I decide to stop watching, but in a video game I expect to have some input into my current situation beyond a musket that fires 2-3 rounds a minute. You know what happens if I tell an officer to get f***ed in gameplay, as they frequently deserve to be told? I'm on my own and the whole style of gameplay I came in for just terminated because some kid just wants to 'call some volleys' and have us do some hopeless charges so he can use his pistol or pretend-shout into the mic. Getting slaughtered can be very fun but I want a say in who gets me slaughtered. If the other people want to lead, let them earn it by evolving so people will follow them.

    I'm not saying nobody pays attention to us two years into open Alpha. I just agree with the other guys who say that more transparency might help once something appears feasible so things aren't coming out of left field two weeks before they're in the game. To me infantry combat is the core of the game that everything should be built off of. You can play the long-game and work on other features, and I look forward to the arty updates, but I don't see why you'd want to. The fact is we can't fill a 150 person server as easily as we could months ago. New content will bring more but at what point does the gameplay and competition and chemistry all fuse together to keep people logging in? I think it happens when the focus is firmly and steadily on pushing players in a direction which takes your best choreographed, orchestrated game footage and strongly compels players do it or something close to it because it benefits their own selves first and foremost.

    And yes I may be completely full of myself but it's not for nothing. I spent years and years trying to orchestrate the best gameplay I could while stressing myself out holding fragile gameplay community together. And all the while I'm just wishing that the developers pulled the trigger and did all the crazy stuff that might have helped. If only we could stop rambos from hiding in a bush taking on whole squads. If only the spawns were more dynamic to reward teamwork. If only the maps were more polished. If only guys like me couldn't literally time a grenade to airburst over the enemy and kill a whole fireteam with ease. Then teamwork would have been better. We mostly all come to the games for the same thing but the game largely has to make it happen because competition is always going to trump the experiences we came looking for.
    Last edited by Poorlaggedman; 06-08-2019 at 06:55 AM.
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  3. #63
    Quote Originally Posted by Poorlaggedman View Post
    The lack of transparency is always befuddling to me but not unique to WoR. The lack of vigor among the community for pushing features I find pretty weird and that's why I've always said there's this real danger of WoR being scene as a platform for digital because that's about what most gamers seem to be able to imagine asking for features but little in the background to make those features come together. The lack of engagement in these Suggestion Forums (beyond the monthly kill-count requests) is probably not helped by the lack of transparency. I'm pretty sure there's only one entity in the universe that can decree something and have it form according to plan the first time and that's not any game developer anywhere. Not to bash picket patrol too much, 'cause more is better, but a lot of people could have raised a lot of questions about that a lot earlier if they had known it was coming down the pipe. Getting a good community grilling on coming features, like the artillery, would probably save time and effort.

    Instead we're just sort of shouting into the darkness and waiting to see what'll be served up. Knowing there's presently no plans to make the officer or NCO roles meaningful is disconcerting to say the least considering the immense effect it has daily on gameplay experiences. The level of discipline and patience required of players to go into a game with a tiny fraction of the killing power available in other games, to obey self-appointed random officers for the sake of going-along-to-get-along, to pursue a frail existence as a formation for a minute or two tops, generally confined to strict cover... it's just too much to ask.
    Some of the lack of vigor in some of us helping push your ideas revolves around the concept of them not applying to large chunks of the community. Speaking as a leader of a large player base we already have a chain of command and know who will lead in different situations and don't need an in game selection system muddying the water so we will not support those ideas sorry... Our main objective is consistency and a lot of that has been solved by pw servers where we can schedule events with our counterparts. It is already enough leg work to coordinate events and don't wish to see that process made further confusing by your proposed changes. If it only affected public servers I wouldn't mind but I would hate to see the devs prioritize things like that over performance, optimization, and new content that will get us one step closer to historical battles mode.

  4. #64
    Mark L. E. E. Smith's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Poorlaggedman View Post
    Some folks on here care less about public gameplay functioning and more about being the pathway to good gaming through recruitment. The more dysfunctional and messy the public gameplay is the easier that pitch is to sell to the remaining players. That's the gaming status quo in these types of games which requires that direct kinship (friends and clans) with a group of players to enjoy the game. It doesn't change between games without features to change it. As serious gamers deviating outside of the mainstream we need unique features more than other communities because we don't come here to spray-and-pray or kill-count.

    They'll go on and on about "PLM I'm tired of your anti-company BS" or, most preposterously, accusing me of not even playing as if there was a shred of truth to it anywhere. What I am is adamantly anti-anti-community folks because I'm all-too familiar with them after 18 years of realism gaming. And we don't have many of those folks but they're most damaging in positions of authority. You see the response: the mere suggestion of addressing this issue and it's like we're on gang turf and threatening someone's way of life.
    Quote Originally Posted by Lord Drax View Post
    Some of the lack of vigor in some of us helping push your ideas revolves around the concept of them not applying to large chunks of the community. Speaking as a leader of a large player base we already have a chain of command and know who will lead in different situations and don't need an in game selection system muddying the water so we will not support those ideas sorry... Our main objective is consistency and a lot of that has been solved by pw servers where we can schedule events with our counterparts. It is already enough leg work to coordinate events and don't wish to see that process made further confusing by your proposed changes. If it only affected public servers I wouldn't mind but I would hate to see the devs prioritize things like that over performance, optimization, and new content that will get us one step closer to historical battles mode.
    Speak of the devil and he doth appear

  5. #65
    I don't think vote kicks work very well. However any vote kick feature really has to be a purely team decision and not require a majority of the whole server to be effective. Many-a-times in gaming have I seen vote kicks fall just short or way short when it was an obvious need to one team or the other. Most demoralizing about a 'kick' is that they just come right back on. They may lose their place in the role but most people come to learn of the absolute futility of removing a player temporarily in a server-wide effort. If anything it amplifies the feeling of helplessness of the average player when the guy just comes right back on. I remember times in other games where guys would come into a server blatantly hacking and stop all gameplay and we still couldn't get 19/32 players to vote kick until an admin came on and banned him.

    I really don't feel like a new player needs to be able to take an officer or NCO role outside of drill camp scenarios. I'd even go so far as to say it's incredibly insulting to everyone around you if you walk into a game like this and try to take charge right away or even to see it as anything other than a privilege granted to you voluntarily by those around you. A new player can absolutely do that but players can then unchoose him just as easily. Just because there's a role for officer doesn't mean it should be an entitlement. It's too important to gameplay to be one. It should be fair to all by being fairly chosen. At worst a new player can learn to mimic the actions of people who successfully acquire those roles so he can rank up himself at some time. There's already an enormous amount of mimicking of what you've already seen when it comes to the officer role. It's like one giant parody of behavior and wording - few want to deviate from what they know others will tolerate. A staleness sets into the gameplay partly stemming from leadership that's generally just mimicking past experiences. They almost have to because they frequently don't have a leg of authority to stand on the only difference between them and any private being that they clicked a different role. The main choice a lot of them are generally making is: when and where to do a column/blob rush, whether to fire-at-will or volley (their choice rarely makes sense), and what fenceline to align to.

    Let players learn how to speak with confidence first and actually learn to lead players who are willing to follow him into a direction that makes sense before they ever touch roles like that. The only way to do that is allowing other players to make those choices. No amount of hard-coded restrictions or informational overlays are going to change things
    Last edited by Poorlaggedman; 06-08-2019 at 10:31 PM.
    Gameplay Suggestions: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjUuaVXTJsY


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  6. #66
    OK, just for grins, let's say a pure vote system is a non starter, and move on from that.

    Let's also assume that the game system can nudge players toward desired behavior, because it already does.

    If the currency of leadership isn't a one man one vote thing, what is it? Right now it's a machine that loads the game fast and the willingness to take the spot.

    So change the currency. Instead of first come first serve, have a pool at game start. You put your hat in the ring, and the game chooses the player with the most currency. Ties are randomly resolved.

    You carry that flag for ten minutes in game, get a buck. TK somebody, lose two bucks. Play as officer and at the end of the game if the majority of the team gives you a thumbs up, gain two bucks. Get killed in formation, get a nickel. Get killed out of line, lose a quarter. Make it so your everyday troll would have to do stuff that trolls don't want to do.

    Make it so the servers can set the parameters and pick a few levels. If you are in debt you are last in line for the top spot, if you are a solid citizen 1-20 bucks you are next in line, Veterans with more than twenty points get preference. Have the server set term limits, have the server randomly pull a solid citizen for the slot ten, twenty or whatever percent of the time to give new guys a chance.

    Make the account of players visible to others as an option, so companies can get an idea if a pub or new player generally plays nice. Get really creative and have company members donate excess currency that companies can use to buy...something. Cosmetics, banner ads, an eagle for the flagpole, something. "Sir, the men chipped in and bought you this really big beard. We love you, man".

    That way you give players two things at once, a reason to come back and invest time in the game, and a probability that the officer knows the difference between Shinola and Manure.

    Seriously, even if it was something as stupid as an engraved sword with a sentiment, a nice custom set of binoculars that made the eyes even more googly when you are looking back at it, a kerchief from fair maiden to tie to the sword hilt, a pair of grips for the pistol, and a little display on the steam profile...all realistic, historical things (except maybe the binos, so make e'm silver or something instead) that would encourage and reward "good" play on public servers, giving the Company men something to harvest besides bragging rights for beating up on the other side, and giving the public players a way to advertise that they play "right".

    If I know my leadership personalities (Old senior enlisted Jarhead) the guys who gravitate towards the officer roles will appreciate any token of esteem from those they lead, and it could be a fun thing to have for the companies to present or recognize in events. Heck, make it so they can buy streamers for an official logo that they get via the company tool.
    Last edited by Msgte; 06-10-2019 at 12:22 AM.

  7. #67
    [17thMI] J.Connelly's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Msgte View Post
    OK, just for grins, let's say a pure vote system is a non starter, and move on from that.

    Let's also assume that the game system can nudge players toward desired behavior, because it already does.

    If the currency of leadership isn't a one man one vote thing, what is it? Right now it's a machine that loads the game fast and the willingness to take the spot.

    So change the currency. Instead of first come first serve, have a pool at game start. You put your hat in the ring, and the game chooses the player with the most currency. Ties are randomly resolved.

    You carry that flag for ten minutes in game, get a buck. TK somebody, lose two bucks. Play as officer and at the end of the game if the majority of the team gives you a thumbs up, gain two bucks. Get killed in formation, get a nickel. Get killed out of line, lose a quarter. Make it so your everyday troll would have to do stuff that trolls don't want to do.

    Make it so the servers can set the parameters and pick a few levels. If you are in debt you are last in line for the top spot, if you are a solid citizen 1-20 bucks you are next in line, Veterans with more than twenty points get preference. Have the server set term limits, have the server randomly pull a solid citizen for the slot ten, twenty or whatever percent of the time to give new guys a chance.

    Make the account of players visible to others as an option, so companies can get an idea if a pub or new player generally plays nice. Get really creative and have company members donate excess currency that companies can use to buy...something. Cosmetics, banner ads, an eagle for the flagpole, something. "Sir, the men chipped in and bought you this really big beard. We love you, man".

    That way you give players two things at once, a reason to come back and invest time in the game, and a probability that the officer knows the difference between Shinola and Manure.

    Seriously, even if it was something as stupid as an engraved sword with a sentiment, a nice custom set of binoculars that made the eyes even more googly when you are looking back at it, a kerchief from fair maiden to tie to the sword hilt, a pair of grips for the pistol, and a little display on the steam profile...all realistic, historical things (except maybe the binos, so make e'm silver or something instead) that would encourage and reward "good" play on public servers, giving the Company men something to harvest besides bragging rights for beating up on the other side, and giving the public players a way to advertise that they play "right".

    If I know my leadership personalities (Old senior enlisted Jarhead) the guys who gravitate towards the officer roles will appreciate any token of esteem from those they lead, and it could be a fun thing to have for the companies to present or recognize in events. Heck, make it so they can buy streamers for an official logo that they get via the company tool.
    I second all of this.

    Perhaps there could also be some sort of individual medal/award system along those lines as well. For example, if you accumulate 2 hours of game time as the flagbearer perhaps you would be awarded a "Color Guard Medal" or something along those lines. The same could be done for marksmanship. If, for instance, you get 50 head shots while in formation, the game may give you an award at the end of the game where you get your 50th such hit. This could be tracked silently so as to not impact gameplay. You could conform these awards to match the actual awards, certifications, or medals that were given by the respective armies at that time. I think these two things would add significantly more depth to gameplay. As always, I'll say this is not at all meant as a criticism. I love WoR. I'm just trying to offer my $.02 in a constructive manner.

  8. #68
    I'm not a fan of any sort of score system. People would be talking less about score systems if the skirmish maps weren't so vanilla with single capture points at permanently fixed locations and a team score system that confuses people and works the clandestine way it does to even the most experienced players.

    I see what he's saying but I don't see why someone's propensity to stay alive in formation with a flag translates to good team leader skills and neither does anything else that can be gauged by a complicated automated score system. The officer role is not a perk to be earned. It's a desperate functioning need for the team. What a monkey wrench to throw into holding an event if you could not turn such a feature off or had selected leaders who miss the mark.

    The basic issue is that the officers and NCOs need to establish consent from the players and the players need to feel like they have a say in the matter so they feel accountable for his success/failure and are less likely to be jeering spectators to the plight of the team. The game needs to handle that better. The no-nonense, most straightforward way of doing that is requring each player to pick a leader out of those who volunteer and then assigning them rank based on their total followers while allowing all that to change based off further player selections. That's pretty simple and allows for many different situations. It wouldn't 'take half the round.' It should take about as long for any player to pick his role in the first place. All he does is click a leader instead of a role or choose to lead and hope for followers. Let the players change their selection on the field through a simple 'join' button / feature when they run into a force they like better than what they have.

    So all 'followers' are privates unless their leader assigns them a rank like Sergeant (or even lower officer ranks). Just get rid of the flag bearer role and make the flags spawn at the base spawn stuck upright into the ground nearest to the largest groups spawning at the base spawn.

    Bonus points if leaders can then hand out lesser ranks to some of their followers and if the system was coded to bypass all that and assign team dictators who could create a chain of command for their whole team (for events and such, though it wouldn't be needed except for a rebellious crowd).

    Also let dead officers wait longer to spawn. I'm tired of them coming back in 30 seconds flat when they keep getting sniped.
    Last edited by Poorlaggedman; 06-11-2019 at 02:15 AM.
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  9. #69
    Hold an event, server settings let whoever runs the server choose who can officer. That seems pretty basic.

    Having a guy who stays in line, carries the flag and avoids TKing and Rambo tactics in general getting a jump on the slot makes more sense than the current system, and the devs aren't buying the vote thing. Being a good Private does not a good Captain make, but in general the behaviour required of a good Private is poison to trolls, so rather than having the consensus best possible officer you'd at least get somebody who has shown they can show up and behave.

    Almost anything would be better than the current system, and PLM's voting and joining system would certainly be an improvement, but since TrustyJam says no vote, I'm kicking around alternatives. Hell, you could go whole hog and require those wanting to officer to go through WoR Officer Candidate School. Show a review board that you have a mike, can use the interface, have a basic concept of things like tickets, point capture, and the difference between defilade and marmalade and you are eligible to lead. Garner enough complaints and the review board takes your commision.

    We may never get a way for players to select the best officer, and in public play maybe that's a good thing. At this point minimizing duds and trolls would big step and if you can't do it by acclaim then you have to have a merit system of some kind. Even on this forum you have to make a certain number of replies before you can post topics.

  10. #70
    I think this alongside the pubbie abuse running rampant right now is the biggest problem for War of Rights. But just like the latter its going to be one of the hardest ones to actually address in game. You obviously can't stop players from playing an in game class...that self defeating. I think thought that it may resolve itself as more games modes with more regiments become more frequent. If a player with officer is doing horribly...go join a regiment led by a player whose better. Quantity may in this case solve problems with quality...

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