116 replies to this topic

[Evolwar]

Hi all,

I believe Siege matches are going on too long, even when teams are uneven in terms of skill on each side. The average game lasts 30 minutes to a hour and I heard some say there were games lasting up to 2 hours (I haven't seen them just rumors from friends). I had to give up most of my siege playing because of the duration it takes to complete. Some of the turn over is from people not being able to stick it out a whole hour (give or take) for a match. Only times I seen games under 30 minutes are when teams are heavily stacked on one side. From some tactics and design aspect I believe siege is less interesting than missile assault, too much down time from getting that EU back or just plain camping (teammates too scared to push in). Something needs to happen. What do you think_

Thanks
Evolwar

Edited by Evolwar, April 29 2013 - 09:06 PM.

[ArnieF4440]

I'm cool with the length of siege matches in its current state. My games typically last around 30mins, which is about right IMHO. Before it used to drag out even longer but thats been fixed a few patches ago (near the start of OB). If a match lasts longer than that, its because the teams are particularly competitive, and that's a good thing... some of my most enjoyable matches were like this

IMO siege is meant to be a drawn out match type, but there are some derpy things about it

Edited by ArnieF4440, April 29 2013 - 09:38 PM.

[Beemann]

I kinda agree when it comes to Siege feeling drawn out but for the most part it's less about match length and more about intensity. I think encouraging/forcing fights over EU would help remedy that, as well as having the AA serve a purpose that isn't pretty much the same one it serves in MA

[MartyFriedman]

I'd say about the 45 minute area would be about right myself.  The sub-20 matches are almost always one-sided and 30 minute ones are where the teams are starting to be mostly evenly skilled, maybe one or two people that are better overall.  Anything over 30 and it's usually because both teams are pretty much even, one just had a slight edge or luck on their side.
Although, I also like the marathon 1.5hr+ matches as long it's not because of last minute battleships, but because teams are perfectly balanced in terms of skill and strategy.

As for the suggestions, I'd kind of like for it to go back to the previous 600 to launch if only to cut back on the EXP hounds that will go and drop off when it's <40 to launch.  Of course, I'd also be fine if the loaders just got locked down if <50 was needed, of course if anyone was inside they'd still be dropping EU, but the others would be locked down.
Would I also be correct in my guess that the short range AA turrets would be similar to the gas canister in the Conker's Bad Fur Day Total War multiplayer mode in that it would instantly kill anyone without adequate protection that's inside the range_

Edited by MartyFriedman, April 29 2013 - 10:47 PM.

[Aptest]

siege mode at the moment has in my mind a lot of issues. It has map layout issues (eu route too safe, maps giving one side advantage in aa control), objective design issue (degrades into binary attack/defense objective) and a rather significant "defender's advantage" issue (which a lot of time doesn't manifest simply because the players are not using their brains to play the game).

There is a lot to fix.

The first problem with this game mode is that the stage of the game where you collect EU does not advance your team towards victory. Collecting EU and more importantly preventing the other team from collecting EU is not something that can make you win the match at this moment. So long as both teams launch some ships, the team with the good grip on the AA is going to win.

A second problem with this game mode is that disrupting the opposing side from collecting EU is really hard. The biggest issue is that the enemy mechs are not exposed to any significant degree while moving to and from the EU station to their base. You can easily defend your EU collection (see above, not actually a good thing to do most of the time) by controling the EU tree vicinity, because the "way home" for your mechs is mostly safe.

A third problem is the big "defender's advantage" on the AA. Basically, a team that arrives at the AA first and sets up a defense is more probable to keep the AA. The defilde position offered by the AA is a sufficient force multiplier to overcome significant skill / composition advantages. Taking the AA back from an entrenched team is difficult and in a lot of games impossible.

I feel this game mode can become a lot more exciting if disrupting the other team's EU collection will have greater value. The EU objective needs to be made significant enough such that teams will be forced to not bunker the AA all game long. This can help a lot.

[Omega22]

From my perspective : there are two parts of seige

1. The fight in the EU gathering
2. Defending and taking control of AA

When teams are evenly matched and we have skill players and team play, the game can run to almost an hour, was in one and only one word can describe it : EPIC

[Omega22]

Aptest, on April 29 2013 - 10:50 PM, said:

siege mode at the moment has in my mind a lot of issues. It has map layout issues (eu route too safe, maps giving one side advantage in aa control), objective design issue (degrades into binary attack/defense objective) and a rather significant "defender's advantage" issue (which a lot of time doesn't manifest simply because the players are not using their brains to play the game).

There is a lot to fix.

The first problem with this game mode is that the stage of the game where you collect EU does not advance your team towards victory. Collecting EU and more importantly preventing the other team from collecting EU is not something that can make you win the match at this moment. So long as both teams launch some ships, the team with the good grip on the AA is going to win.

A second problem with this game mode is that disrupting the opposing side from collecting EU is really hard. The biggest issue is that the enemy mechs are not exposed to any significant degree while moving to and from the EU station to their base. You can easily defend your EU collection (see above, not actually a good thing to do most of the time) by controling the EU tree vicinity, because the "way home" for your mechs is mostly safe.

A third problem is the big "defender's advantage" on the AA. Basically, a team that arrives at the AA first and sets up a defense is more probable to keep the AA. The defilde position offered by the AA is a sufficient force multiplier to overcome significant skill / composition advantages. Taking the AA back from an entrenched team is difficult and in a lot of games impossible.

I feel this game mode can become a lot more exciting if disrupting the other team's EU collection will have greater value. The EU objective needs to be made significant enough such that teams will be forced to not bunker the AA all game long. This can help a lot.

I hear you, i for most part go on a hunt or pick a fight early and disrupt or delay the other teams progress in EU collecting, usually end up dead but i manage to take  a enemy mech down with me.

Buy my team some time to advance/speed their launch of our battleship.

[Aptest]

Omega22, on April 29 2013 - 11:03 PM, said:

I hear you, i for most part go on a hunt or pick a fight early and disrupt or delay the other teams progress in EU collecting, usually end up dead but i manage to take  a enemy mech down with me.

Buy my team some time to advance/speed their launch of our battleship.

under the current conditions for victory, your efforts are futile and counter productive to your team. Your time is better spent setting up a bonfire at the back of the AA and roasting marshmellows there.

[Dinre]

Yeah, I think Siege matches are often going too long.  Anything past 30 minutes is encroaching on players' time unless the length is known ahead of time.  I'm certain this is part of why we lose players late in matches.  Many of us have lives and have to schedule time to play.

The maximum game length in Siege is currently undefined, so that's definitely an area the devs will have to address in the future.  They added the EU countdown to help expedite games, but there is no forced game end.  I'm usually very bored if a game reaches the 45 minute mark, and I'm just wanting it to end.  We need a sudden death mode or a progression-enforcing game element to break the deadlock.  In TF2, they solve this by turning off respawn and removing the ability to pick up health packs once a time limit is reached.  I think that exact approach won't work for Hawken, but something similar might be interesting.  Perhaps a total respawn limit for the team after 30 minutes_

[WarProtocol]

I do not see siege as too long of a mode.
Some matches last 15-20 minutes, some last over 1 hour.
Depends from teams really.
I don't know what was my longest siege game, but it went like 18/3000 , and then the greatest come back ever! 18/0, in the middle of the match enemy team started to leave, seeing they have no chance to get to the AA, or simply the match was too long.
Either way, I do not see it as an obstacle. The lenght of the match is purely dependant on the skills of individual players + team work, because even best players can fail like first day noobs, when their team is malfunctioning all around the map

[Dinre]

WarProtocol, on April 30 2013 - 04:53 AM, said:

I do not see siege as too long of a mode.
Some matches last 15-20 minutes, some last over 1 hour.
Depends from teams really.
I don't know what was my longest siege game, but it went like 18/3000 , and then the greatest come back ever! 18/0, in the middle of the match enemy team started to leave, seeing they have no chance to get to the AA, or simply the match was too long.
Either way, I do not see it as an obstacle. The lenght of the match is purely dependant on the skills of individual players + team work, because even best players can fail like first day noobs, when their team is malfunctioning all around the map

Not sure I agree with that assessment.  The really boring games for me are the ones where we go 30 minutes at 3000/3000.  Both teams are performing really well, and there's absolute deadlock.  That is a design flaw in my mind.  Luckily, those games are few.  I'm afraid they might become more prevalent, though, as players slowly become better.

[Aptest]

long matches are not inherently an issue. In League of legends it is rare for games to conclude in under 20 min, and quite common for matches to last 40+ minutes.

But in siege mode, the action is repetitive. defend AA, attack AA. Gather EU (if stupid).

[Beemann]

I think BS damage needs to be more of a sure thing. Lowering the damage dealt is fine but there ought to be a min damage value of some sort on most Battleships
I think making the AA less "slightly pointless defensive zone" and more "special potential tide turner" would help greatly in fixing the BS/AA portion, and the EU portion could be beefed up in terms of forced conflict

So how about this
There's 3 or more EU points distributed as evenly as possible. EU points activate randomly and dish out either a set amount of energy, or dish out energy for a set period of time. Either way, both teams must fight for the EU in order to launch the ship

The ship itself has one main gun and a series of smaller ones. These are for damaging the enemy base. Players can destroy the smaller guns but the ship will always have a minimum damage value. Players either cannot shoot the ship from their base, or their base is not perfectly defended (turrets could be destroyed). Players can either continue to spawn in the base or spawn on their end of the map. a spawn-furthest system (tied to their end of the map or base of course) is recommended
Upon reaching the opposing base, the BS pulls an alpha and finishes its job

The AA is re-purposed. Instead of being up all the time, it activates after a fixed amount of time, and reactivates after that same time has passed following its activation. The AA requires EU to activate, and requires a short period of time to activate (interruptable)
The AA does damage to enemy mechs and destroys the battleship when activated

Thus we have changed the flow of the gamemode. EU fights are short and mobile, AA fights are absolutely brutal because of the change in momentum they can provide if capitalized on, if bases are assault-able they become important and there's a minimum amount of time that the round can go on for by virtue of having the ships not be completely destructible, and by not allowing that destruction to come from a handful of long range mechs standing in base spamming shots at it

[Dinre]

Beemann, I think you may be onto something there.  I think perhaps the whole Siege mechanic would completely flip if it was possible to damage the enemy base with mechs, instead of only with the battleship.  It would provide a 3-level strategy (defend base, attack enemy base, controll AA) rather than just a single-level strategy (control AA).

Edited by Dinre, April 30 2013 - 09:51 AM.

[Kmaleon73]

No, no, no, siege is the best part of the game, for me and many of my clan siege is perfect like this, the last items should last q, so simple, I've been in epic battles around one hour and a half, for me and many who share the siege mode is fine as is and does not need any changes, so in the game's other modes, from my point of view the siege is perfect as this.

[SilentJacket]

I love seige, too bad it draws out to 45-60+ min

Even so, I love it all the same


if anything, redesign the AA to make it harder to defend

[Beemann]

Kmaleon73, on April 30 2013 - 10:31 AM, said:

No, no, no, siege is the best part of the game, for me and many of my clan siege is perfect like this, the last items should last q, so simple, I've been in epic battles around one hour and a half, for me and many who share the siege mode is fine as is and does not need any changes, so in the game's other modes, from my point of view the siege is perfect as this.

You realize that a team can decide not to take any damage from the Battleship ever by standing in base and shooting it down until the end of time right_

[Leonhardt]

To add to Beemann's post I think the base should be separate from the spawn point to a degree or much harder to get to if there are defenses up like destructible turrets or something like that. This way it provides a tactical spot to defend without the issue of spawn camping. Another thing I'd suggest would be to increase the death timer as the match gets longer to allow plays to be made. It could go up by say 10 seconds every 3-5 minutes or something like that (just random numbers for an example).

For the record I like Beemann's proposed changes. I think it wildly changes the game from "hold the AA or manually shoot down the ship" to a team based strategical game type. Like anything it will need testing, but it has a lot of potential to be the staple gametype for Hawken in the future.

Edited by Leonhardt, April 30 2013 - 11:51 AM.

[adrysmaug]

the bad about AA is if inside are 2 tech and 2 C class, almost impossible take them down

but i like how it is now, it need a team who play together for win, and if the two teams play good, it will be a epic battle, with lot of experience

[Kmaleon73]

Look, for my point of view is fine like this, because both sides have the same options, is as attacking or defending, there are high points in bunches, to place any type of wick, just not very used to in my view the time of readmission to the field is well five seconds are fine, the power system is well established, and have cases q Given the fact a team after the destruction of the ship decican to fight in the area of EU , what happens is q and is the designer's idea is to take the AA, and the enemy trying to take over, is sensiño, everything is in team settings as to the selection of fuses, for me is good as this.