Enable Squad Filling for Missions 2 & 3 in Deep Archimedea

[Gelos.Prime]

I have had a good experience with Deep Archimedea, but would like to see a form of squad filling implemented in the future.  To summarize my PUG experience:

Week 1:  Successfully ran normal DA

Week 2:  Group fell apart in the first mission.  Second group successfully ran everything and I qualified for Elite

Week 3:  Ran Elite DA and we pretty much blew through all 3 missions without any issues

Each run, the lingering uneasiness in my mind was thinking how if any group failed or otherwise fell apart in missions 2 or 3 that I would have to start all over again from scratch in mission 1 with a new group.  Due to the difficulty level involved, each mission takes a fair amount of time to complete and I really didn't look forward to a possible fail in mission 3 and have to then spend the time involved to re-run missions 1 and 2 with a new group.

My suggestion is to implement a squad filling capability where, say, if I had completed mission 1 with a previous group that then fell apart, that when I entered the queue to re-run the series that I would be matched up with a group of less than 4 members who had completed mission 1 but were then moving to start mission 2.  And likewise for having completed mission 2, moving to mission 3.

This functionality would greatly diminish the potential angst and wasted time of successfully completing the first 2 missions only to have the group fall apart in mission 3 and then have to run missions 1 and 2 all over again.

[Chewarette]

Not feasible.

First of all, one of the difficulty constraint of DA/EDA is that you cannot change anything between rounds. With what you propose, one could do the first mission, drop out, change something and come back for stage 2 (with another group). Unless you put some limitations in place, but then the game has to check, or provide you with a checklist of all you had during your initial run, including your Mods !

Secondly, I believe there isn't enough groups with fewer than 4 people going around, so your matchmaking would take ages. more than it would take simply re-doing mission 1/2. Unless in your view, the matchmaking would favor Round 2 parties, but if none exist, it would group you with Round 1 parties ? In which case, I can guarantee most people would matchmake / leave groups as long as they don't find the desired mission. That sounds crazy and not helpful at all.

I understand what you request here, failing at Round 3 when you already spent lots of time doing the first 2 is frustrating, but I don't think there's a solution with the way EDA is designed currently.

[Voltage]

I'm not sure how'd you address the matchmaking. Trials required forced squad forming, for the same reasons outlined in the comment above mine. One of the mode's key points is not changing gear between missions.

I don't know how feasible it is to try and remember player loadout choices and lock them in the second go around. I know forced squad forming is not popular these days, but this is the only thing I can think of as a remedy.

[Lord_Drod]

I've wanted this for a long time in other areas like ESO and circuit.  I don't see why people can't join up with you if you're in public and at the same zone/mission level.  I think it would have success finding others to match you with for a few seconds after the first or 2nd mission.  

This could happen at any point in the first two missions where people die and were not revived and so you end up having to do the next mission solo or with less people.  This seems useful in a variety of other endless modes where players have dropped out and people wish to keep playing.

They'd probably have to do a huge overall to matchmaking.  I don't think it would have to remember loadout choices?  It just connects what you have on, with others like ESO does for the first 2 zones.  It should be applied all the way up and in other areas.  No one would have the ability to change anything, its just a way to reconnect with others at the same level of completion.

[0_The_F00l]

I personally would like the option to start from any mission if you have completed the previous one.

Granted , I accept the argument that the difficulty is for the whole set of 3 missions , not individual sections.

I would say if there is a small check of you needing to lock in your gear until you either complete all three or decide to give up and start from scratch you should be able to get back into it.

So I can only continue if I have the same loadout as last time.

Does that partially invalidate the squad making component ? Yes it does , but if I am going public that was always a risk.

It also allows the player to make tweaks to their loadouts (modding/arcane/ pets maybe) between missions , which makes things a little easier which may be counter to the original design.

 

What I think would be interesting is that we do both of these as an option with some costs.

Here's my thought: 

If you complete a section you are moved to a "safe house hub" where you can put a pin in the progression , and you take on another personal modifier from a list of you do choose to use that checkpoint.

You can then proceed to modify your gear (mods and arcanes only) for the upcoming mission and start the mission vote.

If you fail or get Disconnected you can go back to the safehouse and continue from there.

[Lord_Drod]

It seems weird to get rewards for the first mission if you fail the 2nd mission, and the 2nd if you fail the 3rd.  That kind of defeats the point of having to go all at once.

[_COY_]

2 hours ago, Lord_Drod said:

It seems weird to get rewards for the first mission if you fail the 2nd mission, and the 2nd if you fail the 3rd.  That kind of defeats the point of having to go all at once.

Just imagine the amount of "respect-my-time" complains after a wipe in mission 3.
Remember, those host-migrations still exists; sometimes it's not your fault if a mission failed.
For me it is OK to have some reward for the first missions. It doesn't hurt.

-c0y
 

[PublikDomain]

Edit: I might have a different understanding of what this means as the OP. For failed missions, yeah you should have to start over. But squad filling could be very useful for other cases like migrations or endless missions where it ends for a reason that isn't your fault, like because you disconnected or because everyone but you decided to leave.

14 hours ago, Voltage said:

I'm not sure how'd you address the matchmaking.

Should be pretty easy to do tbh. Conceptually, at least. When you disconnect or are the only one that chooses to stay after a vote, you're immediately put in the waiting queue on a loading screen/new menu. No Orbiter, no changing gear, just plonked into the queue screen. You can stay and wait there as long as you like, and when a slot opens it'll auto-join you to the new group. If you don't want to wait, you can choose to continue by yourself and open your new party for others in the same situation, or you can back out and leave the queue and start over with a new premade.

From a technical perspective it's not really that hard either. You're already allowed to join certain mission types before certain cutoffs, at which point the mission stops being joinable, so there's no reason missions can't also be reopened too. And with DA for example it's really just 3 different missions in a row. There's no technical reason you couldn't search for squads in mission 2. The hardest part would be maintaining state, which could be yucky but isn't an unsolvable problem.

A feature like this would be really nice not just for DA, but also for example endless missions where everyone but you backs out. If you're the last guy you could wait at wave 20 and if someone comes along you could keep going. Or maybe a better example is the Circuit, where you want to keep going but no one else does. So you sit in the round 12 queue and as soon as a public party makes it to round 12 with an empty slot you get joined in.

Edited April 17 by PublikDomain

[Lord_Drod]

12 hours ago, _COY_ said:

Just imagine the amount of "respect-my-time" complains after a wipe in mission 3.
Remember, those host-migrations still exists; sometimes it's not your fault if a mission failed.
For me it is OK to have some reward for the first missions. It doesn't hurt.

-c0y
 

I agree.  I guess they are trying to force coordination more than making it unforgiving.  Locking you into the same gear for all 3 missions should force you to work together more instead of everyone individually adjusting for each mission type.  However, I don't really see that as much of an issue when you only get a small selection and can only take one piece of gear on your own to get max rewards.  Then if they were separate you could abuse your one piece of gear to something more tailored to the mission type.

Simply locking you into your chosen gear and parameters for the full mission could solve this issue and let you run each mission separately, while also allowing you to start with a fresh group, in case you lost some players.  The only issue with that is you'd have the ability to forma and adjust your builds within your loadout for each mission also.  I don't really see that as a problem.

[Mr.Holyroller]

I'd love for a more dedicated matchmaking system for Deep archemdia all together