Ship Scrambling and Other Upcoming Features

[HamsterIV]

Nobody wants to join a game and get paired up with Leroy indefinitely. I think this is one of the reasons games take so long to start. When I join a server and see a level 1 captain with no crew against a pair of Level 5+ captains with full crew I move on to the next server unless I am feeling masochistic or cocky that day.

[Captain Smollett]

I mean this with respectful disagreement but I think the community would have to be at least 4 times larger than it is now for matchmaking to really be feasible and worth the tremendous amount of labor it would take to implement (not to mention the fact that matchmaking would add no benefit to adventure mode).

[RearAdmiralZill]

Nobody wants to join a game and get paired up with Leroy indefinitely. I think this is one of the reasons games take so long to start. When I join a server and see a level 1 captain with no crew against a pair of Level 5+ captains with full crew I move on to the next server unless I am feeling masochistic or cocky that day.

But you would if you had to wait x games before knowing you'd even have a shot?

[HamsterIV]

Even if the community were big enough I don't think GOI is the type of game that would really benefit from automated match making. Games with good match making like LoL are very dependent on individual player skill and less on group cohesion (I may be wrong since I only played LoL for a few weeks). So keeping a group of strangers together until they become an organized team is less important in LoL than it is in GoI.

@Zill
I do feel masochistic or cocky every once in a while (not enough to fly against you). The cockiness tends to wear off after a few games especially if the ally captain is really bad. Some times I do pull off improbable victories.

[RearAdmiralZill]

@Zill
I do feel masochistic or cocky every once in a while (not enough to fly against you). The cockiness tends to wear off after a few games especially if the ally captain is really bad. Some times I do pull off improbable victories.

Fair enough. I just turn my nose at the forced bit at this point. I would honestly make a scramble match in a lot of situations vs non-scramble if it were indeed an option to.

[HamsterIV]

It is probably a matter play style, ship scrambling would benefit my way of playing while probably being a burden to other people's way of playing. I tend to join random games with complete strangers even if I have people on my friend's list online. I assume clan loyalties trump any personal loyalty a player feels to me. So I don't expect a clan member to join my ship if he is already flying with his clan. This style of play leads to very long win streaks or very long loosing streaks. I feel a scramble would help even out the experience.

[Omniraptor]

I feel like this discussion isn't going anywhere. We already know muse's opinion (they will roll out position swap and wait for results). Their immediate course of action is already determined, and nobody seems to have anything against it. The scramble thing is a hazy possibility at best, so can we stop talking about it and focus on the other stuff? Maybe start a new, appropriately named thread? I know this one is named scrambling "and other stuff", but I'd rather have a thread dedicated to each individual change than one big one with conflicting conversations.

[ramjamslam]

I feel like this discussion isn't going anywhere. We already know muse's opinion (they will roll out position swap and wait for results). Their immediate course of action is already determined, and nobody seems to have anything against it. The scramble thing is a hazy possibility at best, so can we stop talking about it and focus on the other stuff? Maybe start a new, appropriately named thread? I know this one is named scrambling "and other stuff", but I'd rather have a thread dedicated to each individual change than one big one with conflicting conversations.

oh yea, whats all this other stuff?  Well from here I am interested to see the regular (with scrambling) and competitive game choices in real live games.  That is the only way we will find how well it fits.

[Piemanlives]

It's the deciding factor, for at the moment it's just all speculation and discussion (some rant but that's not the point). I want to see where this goes, it may work, it may not, it could have disasterous consequences but it could also be fairly nifty, time will tell.

Games with good match making like LoL are very dependent on individual player skill and less on group cohesion (I may be wrong since I only played LoL for a few weeks). So keeping a group of strangers together until they become an organized team is less important in LoL than it is in GoI.

LoL is in fact solo and team based at the same time, for instance all players have to work together to win, however you really don't need much communication, if all team members know their role they can do pretty well versus a team that doesn't know what their doing, this however is another thing entirely.

[Asteria Bisset]

LoL is in fact solo and team based at the same time, for instance all players have to work together to win, however you really don't need much communication, if all team members know their role they can do pretty well versus a team that doesn't know what their doing, this however is another thing entirely.

This is pretty correct. League of Legends is designed around minimal communication and roles that don't vary much from game to game. There are lots of tools that allow for League to implement systems so players don't have to ever talk to each other (which is evident in the pinging system and how it's designed).

[Thomas]

Well I arrived at the discussion late. I think the ship scramble and crew/ship swap would be nice features to have. I think a lot of the issues raised come from a misunderstanding of how it's intended to work.

http://gunsoficarus.com/community/blog/november-at-muse/

From what I've read, I can't tell if it's planned to be an option at match creation, or mandatory

We actually thought through the logic and logistics of where best and how best to implement scramble, and ended up preferring scramble at match creation over voting for a few different reasons.

This post makes me think it's an option at match creation, although the initial blog reads that it would be mandatory in public matches. Personally I feel an option at match creation would be best.

But how it would work is a whole ship swap, taking 1 ship (maybe?) from each blue and red team and having them change places. So instead of team A and B vs C and D, it could end up being team A and C vs B and D.

This means the crew composition on the ship is still the same (so you're still playing with your friends if you're an organized team), and you just have to worry about coordinating with your ally captain(s).

The scramble would take effect after X amount of consecutive wins based on the team (red or blue). In their example, this number is set at 5.

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Regardless of how it works, I don't think it would do much against "stacked" teams. Teams that are stacked and wish to remain so have pretty easy workarounds, such as forfeiting/losing on purpose right before the win streak reaches the threshold. Thus the count is reset and they can keep it up longer. They might not want to lose and just choose to leave the match and create a new lobby. This isn't too bad, as the thought that this will create piles of half filled matches doesn't take into account a player's desire to actually play a match. If the lobby doesn't fill up, they tend to leave it and search for a different lobby. It's an issue that tends to resolve itself.

Then of course the ship/crew swap just might be 'abused', with the previously stacked team ships refusing to start the match until the other captain lets them swap back. In the same manner that players will refuse to start a match until their crew members bring exactly what the captain wants them to bring, and on occasion refusing to start a match until that crew member changes places with one of their friends who they want on their ship.


Then there's the negative side of the scramble. What if teams aren't stacked, but one team still ends up winning 5 times in a row? Maybe it's two pub teams or even two organized teams going head to head. Each deathmatch ending 5-4 or 5-3, one team just barely coming out ahead each time. The scramble would still go into effect. Of course they'd still have the option of crew/ship swapping, but it's just something consider.


Overall it's a nice option allowing for variety and better competition at the unorganized team level, but has a difficult time reducing 'stacked' team situations (in the events where they wish to remain stacked). For organized team matches, it should be difficult for them to reach the win streak necessary for the scramble, and even if they do it's more likely they'd just swap places back; making it not affect them at all.

[Omniraptor]

LoL is in fact solo and team based at the same time, for instance all players have to work together to win, however you really don't need much communication, if all team members know their role they can do pretty well versus a team that doesn't know what their doing, this however is another thing entirely.

This is pretty correct. League of Legends is designed around minimal communication and roles that don't vary much from game to game. There are lots of tools that allow for League to implement systems so players don't have to ever talk to each other (which is evident in the pinging system and how it's designed).

Don't we have a ping system too?

By 'other stuff' I meant the new spawn system, which will affect how games are played pretty drastically. It was mentioned in the blog post, so I thought we might want to talk about it. However, the topic is big enough that it'll probably need its own thread.

[Piemanlives]

LoL is in fact solo and team based at the same time, for instance all players have to work together to win, however you really don't need much communication, if all team members know their role they can do pretty well versus a team that doesn't know what their doing, this however is another thing entirely.

This is pretty correct. League of Legends is designed around minimal communication and roles that don't vary much from game to game. There are lots of tools that allow for League to implement systems so players don't have to ever talk to each other (which is evident in the pinging system and how it's designed).

Don't we have a ping system too?

By 'other stuff' I meant the new spawn system, which will affect how games are played pretty drastically. It's up for testing in dev app right now,and it was mentioned in the blog post, so I thought we might want to talk about it. However, the topic is big enough that it'll probably need its own thread.

We don't have a ping system, unless you count the spy glass. Most experimental features/changes do get their own threads.

[Agraphia]

LoL is in fact solo and team based at the same time, for instance all players have to work together to win, however you really don't need much communication, if all team members know their role they can do pretty well versus a team that doesn't know what their doing, this however is another thing entirely.

This is pretty correct. League of Legends is designed around minimal communication and roles that don't vary much from game to game. There are lots of tools that allow for League to implement systems so players don't have to ever talk to each other (which is evident in the pinging system and how it's designed).

Don't we have a ping system too?

By 'other stuff' I meant the new spawn system, which will affect how games are played pretty drastically. It's up for testing in dev app right now,and it was mentioned in the blog post, so I thought we might want to talk about it. However, the topic is big enough that it'll probably need its own thread.

We don't have a ping system, unless you count the spy glass. Most experimental features/changes do get their own threads.

ENEMY SHIP AT STARBOARD BOW!

REPAIR THE ENGINES!

I'M GETTING THE FRONT GUNS (or something)

Pretty close to pings, if you ask me! ^^

[RearAdmiralZill]

Don't we have a ping system too?

By 'other stuff' I meant the new spawn system, which will affect how games are played pretty drastically. It's up for testing in dev app right now,and it was mentioned in the blog post, so I thought we might want to talk about it. However, the topic is big enough that it'll probably need its own thread.

https://gunsoficarus.com/community/forum/index.php/topic,2081.0.html

Please refrain from talking about dev app mechanics. They are not finalized.