CQC A different game entirely?

kossack

K
Tried to play this weekend...

Good:
- No problems finding a match (Steam reports up to 800 online players!) (DM & TDM)
- Weapons powerup is nerfed! Finally!
- Shorter auto-targeting range.
- Bunch of pretty good players in-game (even with very low ranks)
- Have not seen a single hacker in-game.

Bad:
- Horrible wait visuals (640x480 looks terrible on a 2K monitor...)
- Frequent (three times in an hour) "Can't connect to the matchmaking server" errors in the middle of a match.
- Agility of the ships seems to be nerfed a bit.
- Can't get a CTF match.


So IMHO Arena is an "alpha" release atm. Something on the same level as Star Citizen quality-wise - just a bit more simple. If Frontier plays it right (actually allocates dev resources to it) it has a good chance of success.
 
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Tom Melegaris

T
[up]
Hmm, my observations from Thursday...

Weapons power up worked fine and felt right during game play.
The different weapons for the Imp fighter, Condor, Eagle, and Sidy felt fine. The upper tier weapons for the Sidy may need a second look at tweaking but multi cannon is a blast and I lost several ships to a smart Sidy pilot.
Shields working as described in the stat screen.
Boost works fine.
Oh and silent running...
works, mind your thermal loading though.
Maneuverability fine, and thanks for the flight assist off tip from another tread, sorry I don't recall the name at the moment.

Matchmaking:
Team Death Match fine.
Death Match fine.
Capture the flag did not try,.
I understand there is a discord channel to help with meeting up for a match.
Encountered normal match making wait times and server maintenance.
I believe I was able to match into the wee hours of the morning EST, Thursday thru Saturday.

All in all, I had a blast over the weekend with a occasional "bubba" moment. CQC, gameplay wise, feels like it was when I first prestiged back in March, and that has been over 6 months in time.
 

Globusdiablo

Globusdiablo
kossack said:
...So IMHO Arena is an "alpha" release atm. Something on the same level as Star Citizen quality-wise - just a bit more simple...
Click to expand...

It's been in Alpha since release. Getting a CTF is all but impossible. The non existant lobby is a joke. Arena/CQC will be alive for a week or two due to the free release, and then it will fall back into oblivion.

The lack of any real lobby functions and bots to fill in the empty spaces has doomed this release since release.
 
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SushiCW

SushiCW
kossack said:
- Weapons powerup is nerfed! Finally!
- Shorter auto-targeting range.
Click to expand...

How so? I didn't notice any changes last I played, and there was nothing in the patch notes...

kossack said:
- Agility of the ships seems to be nerfed a bit.
Click to expand...

If I get the chance I'll have to do some testing to see. Personally I feel like the ships are a bit off every time I come back after not playing for a while, I *think* it's all in my head though.

The "toggle FA to stop spinning" trick got patched out though.


All that said I didn't actually get a chance to play this weekend (the times I did attempt it I couldn't get a match within a few minutes of effort), so I'll keep my eyes open.
 

Curtis R. Prophett

Curtis R. Prophett
SushiCW said:
All that said I didn't actually get a chance to play this weekend (the times I did attempt it I couldn't get a match within a few minutes of effort), so I'll keep my eyes open.
Click to expand...

So, interesting thing about this weekend: It seems like either they turned the matchmaker back on, or because there were more people, it actually started working they way that it is supposed to. 90% of the time I could only get a match if there were other Prestige players in the room, or non Prestige players with very good stats. Once or twice I got dropped into a room with only sub lvl 10 beginners (and I promptly left), but for the most part the matchmaker would only group me with comparably skilled players. It meant that I spent more time waiting for a match this weekend than I would have liked, but I am glad that the newcomers were able to play without being dominated by more experienced players. Most of the other higher level player from the discord group were experiencing the same thing, and it may explain your experience Tannik.
 
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kossack

K
SushiCW said:
How so? I didn't notice any changes last I played, and there was nothing in the patch notes...


Personally I feel like the ships are a bit off every time I come back after not playing for a while, I *think* it's all in my head though.
Click to expand...

Perhaps you are right - I have not really played in a long while...
But for whatever it worth - I am clearly remember weapons powerup halving time to kill (~50%). Now it looks more like ~75%.
I also should mention that in a few games shields powerup had no effect at all - so it is possible that it was a bug...
 

SushiCW

SushiCW
Curtis R. Prophett said:
So, interesting thing about this weekend: It seems like either they turned the matchmaker back on, or because there were more people, it actually started working they way that it is supposed to. 90% of the time I could only get a match if there were other Prestige players in the room, or non Prestige players with very good stats. Once or twice I got dropped into a room with only sub lvl 10 beginners (and I promptly left), but for the most part the matchmaker would only group me with comparably skilled players. It meant that I spent more time waiting for a match this weekend than I would have liked, but I am glad that the newcomers were able to play without being dominated by more experienced players. Most of the other higher level player from the discord group were experiencing the same thing, and it may explain your experience Tannik.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I had this theory as well. I wish the game were more transparent about *why* it can't find you a match, it would go a long way toward solving this.

I'm not sure if the thresholding is manually managed or automatically adjusts based on total population, but either way I can see why a player surge would result in it being made stricter. Hopefully some of the new crop will stick around long enough that the matchmaker will let me play with them. :)
 

Calv45

C
Tom Melegaris said:
[up]
Hmm, my observations from Thursday...

Weapons power up worked fine and felt right during game play.
The different weapons for the Imp fighter, Condor, Eagle, and Sidy felt fine. The upper tier weapons for the Sidy may need a second look at tweaking but multi cannon is a blast and I lost several ships to a smart Sidy pilot.
Shields working as described in the stat screen.
Boost works fine.
Oh and silent running...
works, mind your thermal loading though.
Maneuverability fine, and thanks for the flight assist off tip from another tread, sorry I don't recall the name at the moment.

Matchmaking:
Team Death Match fine.
Death Match fine.
Capture the flag did not try,.
I understand there is a discord channel to help with meeting up for a match.
Encountered normal match making wait times and server maintenance.
I believe I was able to match into the wee hours of the morning EST, Thursday thru Saturday.

All in all, I had a blast over the weekend with a occasional "bubba" moment. CQC, gameplay wise, feels like it was when I first prestiged back in March, and that has been over 6 months in time.
Click to expand...



Discord cqc channel https://discord.gg/Js5q3
 

kossack

K
Just a suggestion: If you delete my messages at least tell me why - the one you deleted did not contain any "prohibited material". Not even a mention of Star Citizen...
As I wrote before - suppressing information would not be able to save the game. Quite the opposite.
 

Oogie Boogie

Oogie Boogie
Played Arena/CQC after a break of several weeks. Still like the game...

My personal assumptions:
- It looks different - more colorful - then before 2.1.
- There are probably more "things" (station, asteroids) in the game? But even with a GTX 1080 and 120 FPS, it felt not so smooth like I remembered it.
- matchmaking is so far fine.
- Nerv of Power-Ups? I did not realize that anything was changed.
- Many newbies are playing it - probably the level is higher on a "CQC Friday".

But heard something like "heat attack" or similar in the game. Do we have also Engineers modules for Arena/CQC?
 

Blian

Blian
Oogie Boogie said:
But heard something like "heat attack" or similar in the game. Do we have also Engineers modules for Arena/CQC?
Click to expand...
You probably heard "taking heat damage". That is coming from the heat beams, which are accessible on higher levels. Nothing new here :)
 

Tom Melegaris

T
Oogie Boogie said:
Played Arena/CQC after a break of several weeks. Still like the game...
...
- There are probably more "things" (station, asteroids) in the game? But even with a GTX 1080 and 120 FPS, it felt not so smooth like I remembered it.
Click to expand...

I noticed that also but I am on a low end laptop with low video settings with it limited to 60 FPS. Interestingly, matches seem more stable, more numerous, and I see a variety of skill levels. I get matches well into the earlier am, EST, and matched with everyone from level 1 to players on their 3rd prestige level. I myself just reached level 50 first level prestige, I am now a proud tracking multi cannon sidewinder owner.

Oogie Boogie said:
...
But heard something like "heat attack" or similar in the game. Do we have also Engineers modules for Arena/CQC?
Click to expand...

There are No Engineer modified weapons in CQC, what you are hearing is what is now a standard warning when you are hit by a heat beam.

-Ninjaed by Blian :p
 

[HJ]-RedRaven

[HJ]-RedRaven
Enjoying Arena so far (in open I'm so far out of the bubble there's no one around). Worked from rank 1 to 17, getting mostly 6-7 kills per 2 deaths.

Can definitely tell who's in a Rift/Vive by the way they manoevre.

Main issue for me is that if you refit a ship and just miss the countdown deadline, you get a long delay getting into the next match.
 

MasterThruster

M
Hi there, so first of all I'm new to the forum, bought the game in preorder before the release date, but only recently had time to REALLY kick it, and tbh, comparing to the state Elite was two years ago, it's a milestone of a progress, beautiful work ladies and gents at Frontier, waiting for more updates and expansions !

Ok, so in open I'm moving towards Jaques station, half way through, so no one around, just emptiness of space and awesomeness of exploration (having so much fun!), but as I usually play as a bounty hunter/assasin, I miss a little bit of action here and there, so finally tried CQC, as before I have neglected it, taking it as just another crappy multiplayer mode.

Well, all I can say, if Frontier plays it right, Arena might have a long life and bright future in front of it, but there's so much to improve.

Apart from the suggestions and things you guys pointed out already, I would add:

- practice mode (just you, your ship and map just to get to know the locations etc.)
- more customisation (ship colours etc. as much as it works well in real game, you should have an option to choose your war paint before going in to the battle)
- additional maps (obvious)
- additional modes (I would love to see a mode and some maps strictly for deadly racing ! something like the good old wipeout - that would be a blast !)
- overall menus and interface polish, it really has a rough feeling right now ...
- adding more to the dynamics of a match by adding more juicy comments in specific situations (eg. upon clean kill, while barely making it, crashing into smth and so on)
- are there any match customisation options ? as for now match ends with 800points for a first place, and some of them last literally 3-5minutes, that is way too quick tbh

All in all, I hope they will polish and support CQC and develop it along the way with the very game itself as it is a blast and so much fun ! :)

See you out there commanders.
 
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