Level 3
LiquidRunner wrote:Well with the launch of the MAG Beta you would have had time to download and try out some new features. It would be great to collect some feedback from you regarding the new beta and any suggestions you may have.
Some questions which would be great to answer are below, feel free to add and answer any others
Thanks all!
- LiquidRunnerHow did you find the “Clan Deploy” feature?
Not used it yet - locked down.
What did you think of the Skill tree system that improves how our character customisation system works?
It's nice that such detail has now been given to the character progression aloowing people to greatly customise their character. However I feel that the vast array of options is now quite daunting, even as a MAG veteran, and that more tooltips are required. A brief overview as you cursor over each tree would be a start. A tutorial/manual of some sort would also help new comers to understand how it works.
Secondly about the skill trees themselves, I feel that a numerical value should be given to the upgrades, i.e. increase reload speed by 25%, 50% 75%, which will allow people to make better judgement and worth of skills. Alternatively give hard numbers - reduces reload time by 0.5 seconds, 1 second, 1.5 seconds.
In addition, I think that whilst it may be blatantly obvious that some skills are to be used with certain equipment, it should highlight that equipment requirement in the text. (Or even say whether you own it or not at the time to avoid people wasting points on things they don't yet have.)
Conversely the reverse would also be nice - when in the loadout and item purchase screen, it would be handy to know what skills you have and would be applied to the weapon in question. i.e. if you highlight an assault rifle it would say -25% reload speed. If a scope is attached then maybe steady aim is shown.
I think some of the icons of the skills themselves need tweaking to make them stand apart more - half of the athleticism ones look the same.
Moving on to the shop items, they need to have an option to display the stats and maybe even a compare button. At the very least they need to be given class tags (icons?), and ideally be able to be sorted into weapon classes. If I have skilled up for certain weapon types, it would be nice to know which class each weapon is. Related to this, it would be helpful to know which attachments are to be used on which guns before purchase.
Lastly (although I haven't checked but I doubt it is present), each item in the shop should also display the CC. (On a side note I think CC should be in tens, not units, as for some reason it seems easier to add up in your head.)
Did the in-game economy system that allows users to earn “Credit Points” by completing objectives, finishing missions, and killing enemies work well. Was it fair?
Not sure about the cost as I started as level 59 so could buy pretty much all I wanted straight away. However noticed that you get CP now for ribbons, but I didn't notice too much CP gain otherwise.
I also echo people's concerns regarding newcomers versus veterans and the huge advantage they would have. I agree with people who say that new people should be given a starting balance, earn it through some kind of training, or even get a bonus on level increase.
What did you make of the “Escalation” game type?
Escalation was fun as it is very fast paced, sort of a cross between sabotage and domination, however it seems to through the focus on tactics somewhat out the window.
As others have mentioned, the HUD and voices get confusing at times contradicting what is actually going on. Also, I noticed in the training manual it showed who had control of each point, yet in the actual game it just shows that you either have control, or don't/neutral. Therfore you don't know if an enemy is gaiing control or 2 or if each faction has one each.
Timers would be handy to see how long left before stage switch over (from A, B, C to D, and from D back to A, B, C). You could argue that this allows people to camp in advance, but on the flip side it would mean less yoyo'ing.
The stages need more variety in the obstacles and terrain to make them stand apart more. Although at first they seem to be quite different visually, they feel very similar after a while.
Would also be nice if the starting points for each faction were randomised to mix it up a bit.
Other general notes:
Movement with heavier armour seems much more of a penalty, not only in running, but also much more in aiming, to the point that they can move much faster than you can aim. This is made even worse by the fact that the heavier armour doesn't seem to offer an equal benefit in damage mitigation. (And nothing versus knife from the front either it seems.)
Would be nice to have more loadouts, or loadouts tied to game types. Or the ability to choose 5 loadouts from a pool of loadouts. With increasing number of roles it's getting a pain to have to swap gear around when playing Suppression, Sabotage, Escalation, compared to Acquisition Domination and Interdiction.
Good changes, need some polish and refinement.
Level 3
I'm sorry but at the moment Escalation is just a confusing mess. I have no idea who's capturing what, where I should be going, which team I should be killing at D.... I'm running around like a headless chicken on steroids.
What's happening on the battlefield needs to be made a lot clearer. Each PMC should be shown as a different colour so we know who controls what.
For example:
Raven - Blue
Valor - Green
SVER - Orange
That way if 'D' glows Orange - Raven & Valor know who to go after, and can perhaps even help each other take down the enemy at D.
I would even like to see the dots on the mini map colour coded this way. (Just for Escalation of course)
Level 3
I'm giving you Kudos for that post very good idea to have them coloured coded red and blue is just so confusing special when you are the ones that have but tells you the enemy has it D is pointless all you really need to do is make sure you get A B C as thats what gets you your points all D is for is to keep it going up longer you have it the more time you have for it to go up but so long as you make sure you get A B C the enemy wont get any points but your team will even if aint for long thats what i think your meant to do in that mission from what i've seen so if you need to take D from enemy you have to make sure people are at A B C to take them otherwise you get know where you could just let the other team take D and consuntrate on the 3 other points
Level 7
http://forums.mag.com/t5/Beta-General-Discussion/E
"this would definatley be a great idea, they do need some kind of distiction between pmc's on escalation, i would greatly improve the tactical gameplay of the mode if it was easier to tell which faction is the one defending D.
maybe if they just colour code the dots as per the factions,
raven - blue
sver - orange
valor - green
then some kind of indication on the top progress bars as to which PMC is holding A/B/C in the first stage
and which one is holding D in the second stage of gameplay."
Level 3
SilentShadow777 wrote:
yes spurs, very good post, and very stolen, i posted the same thing a copuple of days ago on mag.com forums
http://forums.mag.com/t5/Beta-General-Discussion/Escalation-yellow-dots-at-D/m-p/729010#M14097
Lol. Sorry pal but I don't even visit the official MAG forums anymore. They're just full of people complaining all the time. Actual constructive feedback gets hidden under a mass of whining threads...
Great minds think alike hey Shadow? 
Have some kudos as well 
Level 7
lol, ok i'll let you off with it this time then 
definatley need to colour code the enemies in some way on escalation.
even if its not pheasible to colourcode by faction, then perhaps
- your faction - blue (as normal)
- opposing faction 1 - red
playing as Raven = SVER
playing as Valor = SVER
playing as SVER = Raven
- opposing faction 2 - orange
playing as Raven = Valor
playing as Valor = Raven
playing as SVER = Valor
Level 3
Heres an ingenious but I would have thought seemingly obviously idea:
Have the faction controlling certain points as their faction colour,
Raven: Blue
Valor: Green
SVER: Orange
This way you know who is taking what and which faction is taking from which other faction, you could even have the enemies as their colours on the HUD, although seeing as blue is the colour for team mates, there may be confusion with regards to Raven...
Level 3
¬.¬
Honestly now...
Btw if you read my wall of text, you'd notice that I said that they actually show the emblem on the training screen to show who controlled which point, but not sure if they were going to carry that over to the actual round.
While it might be nice to know who the enemy is, I don't think that would fit into the 'reality' of the game unless you had it as red dots for unidentified enemy (via motion sensor, fire, etc) and then the dot change colour when they have been identified by sight.
