As an FPS enthusiast, it’s nice to hear more discussion about Star Marine and things like capital ship boarding. They also addressed directly the issues with AC/SM servers and that they have a few critical issues to address to improve their performance.
The most exciting thing from this for me was the discussion around the possibility of using the experimental modes in AC/SM for a capital-ship boarding mode! It’s great to seem them finally realizing the power of these modes and moving towards doing something with them.
I know these episodes are long, so I wrote up some annotations:
Attending this SC Live Session:
Sean Tracy - Sr Director of Tools and Tech Content
Duncan Buntin - Lead Gameplay Programer, Arena Commander Feature Team
Questions:
- Any updates on private AC lobbies?
CIG always had plans to bring back online lobbies, but the feature continued to be pushed. After help from the new Turbulent teams, private lobbies are coming back in 3.20 as a feature called Custom Lobbies. Custom Lobbies will be more robust and have more options than anything private lobbies had.
- Will Organizations be able to arrange games with set numbers of players on set teams.
Yes, custom lobbies will support this.
- Will AC/SM have a rank system? Will it actually be used in matchmaking?
Rankings are being reworked to get rid of the current exploits. CIG is focused on using this system to help with matchmaking. No specific details atm.
- Are there any more unlockables?
New Specturm badges will be coming for game modes. CIG wants to drive progression through rewards via ranking and for things like winning a match (of tank royal, for instance).
- Will there be a spectator mode?
Yes.
- Will there be loadouts to easily customize and choose from in SM?
Eventually.
- When will medical gameplay be added to SM?
Probably not until after medical mechanics are complete for SQ42.
- How is CIG going to address desync and lag?
Yes? They said that they know there are issues but there wasn’t really anything concrete in their response.
- Any news on capital ship infiltration game modes?
Sean and Chris really want this. There are issues blocking it right now (probably whatever killed ToW). Experimental modes are the first step towards this.
- Any new unique FPS maps?
No, they will only use existing assets. This is to keep the AC/SM small and not duplicate effort. Level design people will be busy on other things, but those things could be integrated later into AC/SM.
- Any plans to add FPS PvE missions to SM?
Sometime after 3.20, they would like to add AI to experimental modes. The Good Docter was designed specifically to be a PvE survival mode, but AI was not ready yet.
- Dumb question about what the purpose of AC/SM is.
AC/SM are both for focus testing and for integration into the PU as standalone game modes. This has always been how they are intended and described. Sean acknowledged seal clubbing in AC :D
- Should there be an anonymous mode for AC to prevent teaming.
CIG is focused on making other modes besides battle royal better. Squadron battle and duel modes should help resolve this problem. Battle royal will always be the competitive mode.
- Has there been any thought into smaller squad modes.
Duncan has seen these requests from competitive orgs. They would like 2v2 and 3v3 modes.
- Will you be able to queue into AC modes from anywhere in the PU?
Sean wants this. Being able to jump into AC during quantum jumps would be a perfect example of this and they would love this. There are obvious tech challenges so there’s no real plans here. Sean wants the sim pods to work.
- Are party limits changing?
Limits will be different depending on game modes.
- Could dynamic events become their own game modes in AC?
They could maybe.
- Any plans to add more training modules?
Different types of gameplay should be expanded to AC (mining, salvaging, etc). No solid plans.
- In Multicrew AC, will a gunner be able to move to different turrets (ie: in a Hammerhead)?
A lot of talk about what they want, but nothing solid.
- Will you be able to fly down to a planet?
There will be a map in 3.20 where you can go down to the planet (Winter Circle, which is an atmospheric flight map. This is a brand new planet that the AC team worked with the Planet team on).
Some random discussion about Master Modes and working with Evocati on the Experimental Modes here.
- Will there ever be destructable environments? Will Tonks get stuck on everything in Tonk Royal?
CIG is working on a system called Maelstrom that controls destructable objects.
- What expermiental mode would you like to see?
Dujncan: Something like an infection mode. Asymetric teams where 1 person or a small team of people have much more powerful equipment that the rest of the lobby.
Sean: Theaters of War :D and asymetrical teams.
- Where’s Theaters of War?
Sean: we want to deploy ToW as an experimental mode. Performance issues are still blocking it and player count may start with only 20 players.
Thanks for typing these up. I don’t always have an hour to spend watching dev chats that may or may not have anything good in them.
No problem. I watched it on 2x speed 😄
I haven’t been this excited for a patch in a while. AC needed some love and all of this sounds pretty good! I just hope Evocati gets the bugs out before it hits Live.