So what obvious lessons have we learned?

I've played games like DOTA/LoL prior to ever getting MNC, and the concept of creeps/minions/bots, pushing, and zoning was pretty much hammered into me by those games. LoL had a tutorial at least explaining the significance of the NPC units, towers/turrets, etc. The company that makes LoL also has official video tutorials on general gameplay and hero specific game play every time a new champion/class is released.

In MNC, A lot of the class specific things I discovered on my own or discovered after players did them to me. If I like a game, I also research the hell out of it. Most players DON'T go to outside sources for an extended period of time researching the dynamics of a game.

I'm not saying there even needs to be a class specific tutorial (would be nice though), but there needs to be a tutorial better explaining the whole motivation behind killing enemy bots while defending yours, ESPECIALLY to those players who are completely new to the DOTA/LoL/HoN elements of the objective based gameplay. Hell, start promoting the fact that YOU WILL RANK UP QUICKER if you lead in bot kills.

[The video he is refering to is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1b8oYpo-65s&feature=channel_video_title ]

The most important thing to manage with the gunner is Pre-Spining the minigun by using alternate fire, ensuring you will be dealing maximum damage per second as soon as you start firing. Note that the gunner walks slowly while spining the minigun, and plan accordingly.

The speed on which enemies die in those clips depend on a lot of things. Not everyone wears armor endorsements, allowing the mini gun to melt them pretty quickly. The lowest Rate of Fire endorsement I run in those videos is Silver. A lot of those clips also feature me using Gold Criticals and Deploying at the right moment.

While many experienced players rag on deploy, you should note it boosts the following:
-Critical Chance (increasing with each level of deploy)
-Damage Reduction/Armor
-Accuracy (effectively meaning more damage retained over distance)

Deployed gunners also slow their targets when shooting them, and are immune to crowd control like grapples and knockback.

Hope this helps.

9 times out of 10 you will be able to see them as well once you know what to look for

Another tip, play a few games as a sin, and try to ONLY kill bots, this makes that you will have to look for where people are and gonna be, it's great because when you know that you can later also start killing them by suprise.

The populations seems to have leveled down to 400.

Is the pub scene a little less newbish? I want to try to find a server with better ping later today.

in AUS we are still getting newer people and have noticed now that at least 2 servers have people on them, ITS AMAZING! now bring the DLC

I hope that Uber is going to try to entice these people to play.

http://vps10217.xlshosting.net/?p=pgraph

I just want to play later today.

Yes the population has matured a bit. Most people are now level 20-30 and understand the basic concepts of pvp and how to use their skills. Randomly you'll see new people using the annihilator, ejectors, and focusing on killing bots. Games are now decided by which team has the new players that still have no idea what's going on.

I remember meeting a tank that would prioritize the annihilator better than the rest of his team. Level 31 he was.

Tonight I will play some MNC. After I set up the new printer.

That the good old fashioned, Rockets , ShaveICe > Everything else Is still golden.

Oh that and telling people to stop spawning gapshots on Steel Peel.

As far as steam games go, this game was pretty nooby friendly.

Try playing Killing floor, CSS, any other number of games that have the same setup.

This one at least had a tutorial that i found fun.

What i learnt is that MNC is still mostly fun to play despite some balance issues.

And that i'm not the only person who leaves a server when Uncle Tullys comes up on the map rotation. I've watched servers empty.

And i even saw someone other than me rush for the zapper. It caught me by surprise more than once. The third time i was standing on the plate when it came off cooldown. (This person was on the OTHER team, after all)

On a sidenote, did you find KF hard to get in? i found that game also noob friendly (if you understood that you first had to go into beginner and not suicidal, which not everybody understand )

As a gamer who picks the hardest difficulty of a videogame as a reflex, i very quickly discovered how KF was supposed to be played, yes. :lol:

But i didn't find it too hard to get into - though i don't play online with randoms.

I dislike the idea of constantly wiping on wave 7 because nobody plays the game properly in a random pub.

Kindof how most of my random pub MNC matches end up either a pubstomp or a stalemate depending on if i'm playing with friends/other known regulars on the same or opposite teams... :?

..and I just found out that I just suck at MNC.
As suggested, I played Assassin yesterday. Was nice and not bad (killed 69 bots, 6 players and had "only" 4 deaths). The next time, there were three assassins on the team.. yuck.. so I switched back to my gunner (to not be the fourth assassin). No fun at all: Got killed every second minute, shred only about 30 bots ..well.. felt like I had a crosshair pinned on my back. A slow moving target I guess.
Today I switched to tank and that definitely was the end of fun (again: Three assassins on the team. Doing what exactly?) Thirty seconds.. bam.. killed.. respawned.. thirty seconds.. bam.. and again and again and again and again. Killed by two assassins, a gunner, one assaults, one sniper. Heyo? Anyone NOT having killed that stupid moron playing tank? Here you go! Have fun. That was devastating, embarrassing, frustrating..
g-r-e-a-t!

Were you the player I killed 4 times in a row as Sniper, the last 3 times just coming out of spawn? Sounds pretty similar, and Tank to boot.

Christ Killing Floor eat me for breakfast when I first got It, then came back for seconds.

Luckily not. I managed to move at least a bit away from spawn after getting killed again (and again and again and again). Three kills in a row right off from spawn? Then I would only wish to have bought a hard copy of the game to have something to shred into pieces with nail scissors.

MNC is a very team focused game. As such if your team is doing horrible (read: three assassins) you're likely going to find yourself facing the ENTIRE enemy team all at once when you leave your team's spawn area/base. That's annoying for anyone so don't worry

Then it's time to stop complaining and start carrying.

Carry three assassins? No. No. That's not true. That's impossible!