5 replies to this topic

[Gen0]

To everyone playing the beta, idk if you are actually allowed to tell me till I get my key on the 19th, but will mechs have specialisation bonuses?

Personally I think this would make all the difference in the world to keeping the mechs from being bland and boring in the long term.

For what I mean when I say specialisation bonuses, I mean a percentage bonuses to a base skill or two for each mech, allowing interesting builds to be made but also showing off what a chassis is actually made for while still making it customisable.

For example, take the Longbow from Mechwarrior 4:Mercs. It was supposed to be by and large a long range support mech. If it came with a 5% boost to missile range per a certain skill (say Assault mechs or the Longbows own special skill), then it would be able to outrange everything to make up for its comparatively weak armor for an Assault mech.

Buuuuut! The beauty of that idea is that someone can pile on the tonnage to the Longbow and make it averagely defended against other mechs (at the cost of speed and used tonnage), then utilise its range bonus for something like Flack guns (or SRMs in this case), making the mech a surprise close range damage dealer even if suboptimal against others (as all machines would have a bonus to something and I'd expect a lot of assaults having a bonus to damage or resists) the pure shock factor could make it a useful bait mech for team tactics at the very least.

This is just a simple example, but I can see millions of uses for it, look at Eve:Online where I got the idea from. You could give speed, BACs or per sensor unit boosts directly to some scouts, ECM reload boosts to certain units like the MadCat and heat dissipation per sink bonuses to pure beam shooters. The idea would literally be to give a level bonus to every mecha.

Of course the reason you would do this over just increasing base stats would be the fact that to become optimum at a certain mech now needs some XP (or skills) as lots of these would be done on top of base stats as per skill level buffs.

Edited by Gen0, 16 June 2012 - 06:14 AM.

[Listless Nomad]

I'm going to have to politely disagree with your suggestion. Bonuses like that will lead to uber mechs or builds that are constructed to the complete exclusion of others. I'd prefer to see things remain level and pilot skill based.

That being said, you can buy a key on the 19th but you can lt play until August 7th. Just a heads up.

[Adridos]

I agree with Listless... oh, wait.

The specialisation of mechs idea was here beofore, but it takes away the customisability. Really, if you get a Catapult, you can build it thousand ways, but with the bonus, only stripping all armor and lasers for the sake of biggest missiles with as much amunition as you can put in it would be the option polayers would accept. Everything else would just waste potential.

[Gen0]

Hmm, you seem to misunderstand me slightly. I'm not just suggesting something that just makes a mech better with a certain weapon. Its not about making mechs worse in a vacuum, its about making them different from other mechs.

Listless, your point makes a lot of sense. I'm just trying to think of reasons that a player would want to experiment in fitting between mechs. To me, the mech I pick is purely for the looks and stats as long as it can fit the weapons I want to use. The concept of the 'buff' being able to affect basic stats adds to that, meaning I'm not just always going to the Daishi, Fafnir or Atlas just becasue it can fit the biggest guns in the Assault class.

My idea instead promotes there being a 'best mech for your playstyle' as well as an ability to go against this for the sake of pure surprise, for example that aforementioned longbow fitting a medium range setup and more armor would result in a brawler that has just enough more range in battle for the smart pilot to play with a new style. (the style being hang back and try to fight him a little further than his own range).


Adridos you Catapult idea doesn't make sense but I'm assuming you meant the Longbow so I'll pretend you said that. (Longbow has mainly just missile slots in MW4 so you first point is moot, http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Longbow) If the building method in anywhere near similar it will be the same, if not then just add a range bonus full stop.

With the longbow you could do that, and that would make it a very effective damage dealer, but very ineffective as with no armour, as soon as someone can hit with even a basic AC it's gonna get holes in it like paper and start losing systems. That's the point, its become a hell of a lot more interesting a dynamic now, eh?

Edited by Gen0, 16 June 2012 - 07:17 AM.

[Praetorians]

Gen0, on 16 June 2012 - 07:00 AM, said:

Hmm, you seem to misunderstand me slightly. I'm not just suggesting something that just makes a mech better with a certain weapon. Its not about making mechs worse in a vacuum, its about making them different from other mechs.

Listless, your point makes a lot of sense. I'm just trying to think of reasons that a player would want to experiment in fitting between mechs. To me, the mech I pick is purely for the looks and stats as long as it can fit the weapons I want to use. The concept of the 'buff' being able to affect basic stats adds to that, meaning I'm not just always going to the Daishi, Fafnir or Atlas just becasue it can fit the biggest guns in the Assault class.

My idea instead promotes there being a 'best mech for your playstyle' as well as an ability to go against this for the sake of pure surprise, for example that aforementioned longbow fitting a medium range setup and more armor would result in a brawler that has just enough more range in battle for the smart pilot to play with a new style. (the style being hang back and try to fight him a little further than his own range).


Adridos you Catapult idea doesn't make sense but I'm assuming you meant the Longbow so I'll pretend you said that. (Longbow has mainly just missile slots in MW4 so you first point is moot, http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Longbow) If the building method in anywhere near similar it will be the same, if not then just add a range bonus full stop.

With the longbow you could do that, and that would make it a very effective damage dealer, but very ineffective as with no armour, as soon as someone can hit with even a basic AC it's gonna get holes in it like paper and start losing systems. That's the point, its become a hell of a lot more interesting a dynamic now, eh?

Actualy Adridos is quite right giveing a mech a 5% range bonus with missile weapons woudl lead to peoplw stripping down the catapult to mount LRM20s instead fo 15s and more ammo .. and useing that 5% difference to pummel mechs from farther than they can hit.. this would in fact become the accepted norm and woudl cause a good amount of expected load issues or an alpha build that is expected out of the players of that mech ... putting bonuses like that in game would ruin costomization .. if you ever ran accross WoT and played clan wars ... if you didnt have a certain tank for a map you would not be used.. unless they had nobody else.. that system ruined that game ... and if people wanted to play they had to have the tank for the map not the tank they were best in

[Chaos Revolution byme]

Praetorians, on 16 June 2012 - 02:10 PM, said:

Actualy Adridos is quite right giveing a mech a 5% range bonus with missile weapons woudl lead to peoplw stripping down the catapult to mount LRM20s instead fo 15s and more ammo .. and useing that 5% difference to pummel mechs from farther than they can hit.. this would in fact become the accepted norm and woudl cause a good amount of expected load issues or an alpha build that is expected out of the players of that mech ... putting bonuses like that in game would ruin costomization .. if you ever ran accross WoT and played clan wars ... if you didnt have a certain tank for a map you would not be used.. unless they had nobody else.. that system ruined that game ... and if people wanted to play they had to have the tank for the map not the tank they were best in

i'm agree with that...

greetzzzz,
chaos