Lack of DCS WW2 MP Participation

[DeepDrummer]

I'll give it a go soon. It'll give you guys something to shoot at anyway.

As soon as I get the training wheels off my wing tips that is.

There is no hope for me in combat but I do Love the air.

[JokerMan]

1. Thoughtful multiplayer mission making is key to success, something over which the developer has little direct control. Simple dogfight servers with a few bases and a couple of key ground targets will only keep people interested for a short while. ................

 

True for those who want to fly as a group and play out historical or semi historical scenarios. No negative comment to SP here .... there will be a constant stream of new players coming along to keep it alive .. just not much for many of the longer term players looking for dynamic campaign which are influenced by other players even if I don't want to actually fly PvP. SP game play is possible on a MP server ... not the other way around obviously... so of ED have set their stall out for SP in the main ...feels to me to be an opportunity missed to not even be willing to offer a longer term vision of MP.

 

2. ED need to really reconsider the purpose of the Normandy map. Having the Advanced Landing Grounds already in place was a serious design limitation. A base map which included only the pre-invasion permanent bases would provide us with scenarios from 1941 to 1944... as it is, we have about 14 days’ worth of historical scenarios we can work with. To my mind, this an almost inexplicable failure of design.

 

This is a really big point and I hope the apparent resistance expressed to changes to map are not so strict as to not revisit this specific issue with the hardcoded airfield placement. A huge effort put in clearly and a shame given how restrictive it now makes that area of the map from an historical campaign building point of view.

 

 

4. Whilst the basic functions of the Mission Editor are good, the DCS platform is very limited and non-user-friendly with respect to many of the things that could be achieved inCLoD in particular (automation and remote database connections in particular). In CloD we (SoW) ran a 24/7 persistent campaign with limited aircraft supplies, fixed squadron bases, over 300 persistent-damage targets on the map, with Career-based pilot stats (using historically-based victory recording which allowed things like "shared" victories between pilots) dynamic AI which used and responded to the strategic situation without need for human intervention, we also had 10,000 placed units on the mapand it ran fine. DCS is nowhere near being able to do this, and it's not looking like it will ever get there. The best we can probably hope for is a WW2 blue-flag type environment. ED have stated multiple times that their most important customers are the Single-player guys... so I get the impression that the multiplayer scene seems to be a bit of an ugly child from a customer voice perspective. A truly engaging multiplayer scene can actually substitute for single player also. A lot of single player guys do NOT want to fight against, or be “interrupted” (greifed etc) by humans. So a really smart multiplayer server or mission will provide enough “room” for single-plyer pilots to join, to go about their business and engage with A.I. or with wider environment without being forced to bump into other humans. I believe we achieved this with SoW in CloD. But it takes a lot of dedication and thought to make it work. Thisis one way to bridge the gap between the “single player” and “multiplayer”community.

 

With that said, I'm not sure DCS is ever going to be capable of a "huge" multiplayer scene. I would expect peak numbers of 100 to 200 pilots simultaneously online - similar to what CloD was getting in late 2016.

 

I guess that hope that DCS WW2 MP would offer the next platform for the likes of a Storm of War server is shot .... which is quite a disappointment really.

 

With so much going on .... Map unification, Damage model work, etc ... it may be flawed to expect any short term input from ED specifically concerning the points made here in this thread ... but then again, maybe they will offer some medium and longer term reaction.

 

We can always hope I suppose .... just keep breathing

Edited June 29, 2017 by JokerMan