43 replies to this topic

[Pecosdude]

Jaroth Corbett, on 10 September 2014 - 06:10 AM, said:

.......
So PGI has announced that they cut ties with IGP. In light of that, I want to talk about what has happened, what is happening & what I hope WILL happen.
.......

What?? I failed to see what yout rant has anything to do to explained why PGI cut ties with IGP.
You did not mention what has happen to cause PGI to cut ties with IGP, whats currently happening to them, and what do you think will happen?

[Jaroth Corbett]

Notice the period? One sentence has ended & another began.

Oh also, this was not a rant.

Edited by Jaroth Corbett, 10 September 2014 - 01:00 PM.

[Pecosdude]

Jaroth Corbett, on 10 September 2014 - 01:00 PM, said:

Notice the period? One sentence has ended & another began.

Oh also, this was not a rant.

Oh well, thanks anyway. I was really curious about what did really happen with them (the inside story).
I was thinking; may be he got sidetrack and forgot to wrote what he really wanted in the first place.

[VanillaG]

Jaroth Corbett, on 10 September 2014 - 06:10 AM, said:

Clan equipment is SUPPOSED to be better. WAY better. To quote TROs & all the text from novels would only serve to make this a super long post. I will sum it up with one line that I think encompasses everything:

Haakon Magnusson shook his head. "The Clans make our weapons look like toys compared to what they bring to battle."

Blood of Kerensky Trilogy - Book 2 - Blood Legacy

Nerfing the Clans is IDIOTIC. You are enraging & ostracizing a sizeable chunk of your fan base by constantly surrendering to whining noobs & IS stalwarts.

What is their excuse? It would break the game. Nobody would play IS mechs anymore. You know what I say to that?

When you look at the stats for clan weapons, they are about 20% better when it comes to weight, crits, range, and heat if any stats are different. For the mech components ES and FF are 50% better and DHS are about 33% better. The real overpowered piece of equipment that they have is XL Engines that don't die to the loss of a side torso. I think once they put in a heat penalty for losing a side torso that will be balanced.

Jaroth Corbett, on 10 September 2014 - 06:56 AM, said:

I think you are underrating the Terran to the weakness of a Zerg perhaps but my main point is:

If this is supposed to be 3050 then the guys that have been thumping their chests from day one of Closed Beta that they are IS should not be using Clan tech of any kind & choosing to be a IS player, you should sack up & accept that knowing however :



You have to take the good with the bad.

While their equipment gave Clan warriors an advantage in one-on-one combat, the fact that their army is filled with warriors that survived a program with a greater than 90% washout rate. Clan warriors are the equivalent to Navy SEALs or Green Berets and the IS is equivalent to the regular army. But even with their one-on-one advantage, they were not that much better than the IS. In the Blood of Kerensky trilogy Ulric makes are remark about the bidding for Tukayiid where he says that based on the force bid they would need to achieve a 1.3 kill ratio to win and no clan had come close to that thus far in any battles they had fought. So while they are better, they are not WAY better.

Edited by VanillaG, 10 September 2014 - 01:37 PM.

[PSY 5]

As far as I could gather from the lore, another thing which mitigated a LOT of the Clans' raw force was the aggressive bidding among them to take worlds. Ever eager to win acclaim, they would frequently underbid one another to ridiculously low numbers for the right to go to war. Then there was also the fact that they would each call targets and stick to them 1v1 almost exclusively - no team focusing single mechs like IS mechwarriors did. The lore had its built in balancing features which for all intents and purposes can never make it into the game. That's definitely something to take into account when dealing with game balance. Players will not necessarily adhere to clan culture or combat etiquette, so incorporating other balancing "features" might not be so far off base. Just my 2 cents.

[Gyrok]

John Wolf, on 10 September 2014 - 07:54 AM, said:

Above my pay grade Nathan! Check the announcements, though if I recall correctly they explained why it wouldn't be going 10 v 12. I'd link the post myself but heading out shortly.

Those were patent excuses that basically amounted to "not enough manpower".

I have even offered solutions to one of your own, whether they read it or not is another matter...

[Lily from animove]

remake MW3 pls, its not working on the most peoples PC anymore and was probably the best MW game so far.

[FriscoeHotsauce]

ALRIGHT, alright, alright.

Lets talk about lore and it's place in MWO.

The developers have chosen to take the lore as the background setting for MWO. They have said multiple times that they won't follow the TRO's exactly, but they will continue to draw on them for inspiration. The lore will be an important part, but we need to allow PGI to have their creative interpretation.

IN THE PAST

The developers have followed the lore to exact Technical Readout specs, creating a whole series of mechs that are simply better than inner sphere mechs. Weapons do more damage, generate less heat, and mechs can carry more of these better weapons to boot. This system is not ideal for a first person mech simulator. Firstly, it obsoletes an entire series of mechs (The Inner Sphere), as every Mechwarrior game has done in the past.

This works for a single player campaign quite well, as it helps give a sense of progression. As you play the game, your mechs get better, your weapons get better, and you feel more powerful and empowered as the player. This is the system that previous mechwarrior games instituted, and in a time where (as you yourself say) playing online meant not receiving phone calls, putting extra effort into balancing an intricate online multiplayer experience simply was not a worthwhile investment.

My best example i can come up with is the MOBA genre, and the variety of characters you can play. For example, you can play as the sad child mummy Amumu (spoiler, he's a giant dork, but a viable character) in League of Legends, or you can play as hulking, axe-weilding king of Noxus, Darius. Now, would it be fair if, because the lore said so,Darius has an axe and armor so he's simply better than Amumu in every way. In fact, all of the characters that don't carry weapons and wear armor are just weaker all around than the ones that do. This is in a game that is intended to be a balanced experience where every character is good at something.

My whole point is, and you made this point against yourself with Starcraft, each mech (faction, character, whatever) needs to be viable and balanced. You can't simply say "The protoss are better than the terrans because LORE" and expect to have a balanced game. And if you don't want the game to be balanced (because LORE), then the Inner Sphere mechs have no reason to exist, and they should call it Clan Warrior Online.

That's how it needs to be though, every character (mech) must have strengths and weaknesses and be just as viable as another, even if some are better in some situations, and worse in others. The lore can not dictate balance in an online multiplayer game. You can not simply say "Hey, every mech you've bought up to the clan invasion is now obsolete, there are better ones now". You also can't say (in terms of league) "Hey, Amumu the sad mummy sucks as a character, so your team can have a 6th player, as long as all the characters on your team suck, that way you are even with the team of 5 good champions".


In summary, I hope there's some reasonable examples and context here. If there's one thing to take away, it's that we should all think as MW:O as a competitive online mech simulator in the Battle Tech universe instead of a Clan Mechs are Better simulator, because the lore says so. MWO is a competitive shooter first, and in that context (regardless of lore), the mechs MUST be balanced in a 1 to 1 sense. Each mech is still allowed strengths and weaknesses, and honestly, I think there's a pretty good balance of DPS versus Burst damage with the Clan and IS mechs respectively.

Edited by Flavious59, 10 September 2014 - 04:54 PM.

[CN9 ACE PILOT]

I'm, ah....I'll just put this here and walk away.

Regarding the question of what is canon within the BattleTech universe, Line Developer Herbert A. Beas II provided the following official answer on the official BattleTech Forum:^[1]
(edited slightly for improved formatting)

Whatever we establish for research material for the authors is canon.
Currently, that list includes:

• All sourcebooks and novels produced for BattleTech by FASA and Roc in the United States
  
• All sourcebooks and novels produced for Classic BattleTech by FanPro and Roc in the United States
  
• All sourcebooks and novels (including electronic publications, such as BattleCorps) produced by InMediaRes (and its subsidiaries, BattleCorps and Catalyst Game Labs) in the United States
  
• All material produced by WizKids for the MechWarrior: Dark Age/MechWarrior: Age of Destruction game lines

GENERAL INCLUSIVE NOTE: There are a few select instances where a story or article appearing even in these sources may be considered non-canon, but generally this is because the material was in error [...], or it was specifically published as a gag [...].
The list does not include:

• Magazines, even "official" ones such as BattleTechnology, 'Mech, and others
  
• The MechWarrior, MechCommander, and MechAssault video and computer games, as well as the various BattleTech games produced for Nintendo and Sega game systems
  
• The BattleTech cartoon series
  
• The BattleTech comic book series

GENERAL NON-INCLUSIVE NOTE: Despite their non-canonical status, we have not gone into total denial about these sources either, but have simply opted to pick and choose what elements there are "canon" and what are not.

[Lucky Moniker]

but at the same time i can not help but feel the Clans have been nerfed too hard, in some areas they are far superior but they are lacking in other areas. I feel the weapon nerfs have gone a little too far.

[CN9 ACE PILOT]

Lucky Moniker, on 10 September 2014 - 05:31 PM, said:

but at the same time i can not help but feel the Clans have been nerfed too hard, in some areas they are far superior but they are lacking in other areas. I feel the weapon nerfs have gone a little too far.

But in that lies the problem.

This game is Free to Play, with a limited budget dependent on micro transactions, I recall somewhere GXP conversion was said to be one of their top sellers. With that in mind it's my belief that new players, not only to the game but the whole franchise will be inclined to spend a bit just to max out a variant, and with a 13 year gap between this and MW4, many had never even heard of battletech, but the robots alone would draw their attention.

The company will have to pay for servers and what not, while lore wise the nerfs seem "too harsh", I would like to think of it more as a "Work in progress" since the game itself needs some tuning.

Clan Mechs had, in my opinion two advantages which would make them look "OP" at first glance. For the sake of this example lets look at Medium laser category. First was the range, with a whopping 67.5% advantage over their IS counter parts on base range alone combined with the 57% damage increase. It was devastating before you could even reach an effective range for your weapons, While they can do full damage at 67.5% at the same range IS Medium Laser would deal 2.4 Damage at 400m while the Clan Med laser would deal a full 7.0. Making it deal 291.6% more damage than an IS weapons.

The other being recycle rate of AC/LRM(Cluster formation) creating a near perma shake, making already the equivalent of an XL engine mech, survive punishment as if it were a standard engine. So, not only would it be difficult to allocate the damage damage to the torso you want, you have to deal with the constant shake.

However the downside always was the heat, i tried to explain to many people not to attempt to play the poke game against them, because it's a loosing battle, you have to get in close and use their only true flaw against them. Get in close, survive the initial burst, take down their torso/arm with the most weapons before it starts back up or blast its CT. At close range, the damage differential drops from 291.6% to the original 57% which is a much more manageable number, given the heat will make them slow down fire rate, or risk shutting down.

[Lucky Moniker]

I am not referring to being nerfed compared to the lore, I am speaking of nerfed compared to their IS counterparts. You are ignoring the other inherent flaws in the weapons, yes you can hit those MLas farther away, but with that increased burn time, the chances of you getting 100% of the damage on the mech drops a lot, ESPECIALLY at those longer ranges where they have the advantage. I am not saying it is a weak weapon, especially the Mlas where it is even more obvious, but the "skill" cap these have can only do so much.

And about the AC's, the cluster fire makes them very difficult to hit the same location when both mech are moving. Again not impossible, but the added time spent facing the enemy head on increases the chance they have to hit you where they want to, which also matters for the increase in burn time on the lasers.

This makes dueling in a clan mech much more difficult, which is sad considering the lore.

[Jaroth Corbett]

Lucky Moniker, on 10 September 2014 - 05:31 PM, said:

but at the same time i can not help but feel the Clans have been nerfed too hard, in some areas they are far superior but they are lacking in other areas. I feel the weapon nerfs have gone a little too far.

^^ This.

This table shows what we worked with in MW3 & we got along just fine. There was never any buffing or nerfing. Those values were set for the game & that was what we had to work with.

Why not initiate a cutdown system? Cutdown - The accepted minimum force necessary to win a Trial.

The game is currently set at 12 max players per team. Set the Clan cutdown to 6. If you play 6 vs 12 you get some kind of reward. If you go higher you get less of a reward. e.g. Cutdown = 1000 XP, 7 players = Cutdown +1 = 900 XP, 8 players = Cutdown +2 = 800 XP. etc.


I still say bring the timeline forward, give both sides access to Omnitech & let us have at it.

Edited by Jaroth Corbett, 11 September 2014 - 01:08 AM.

[IraqiWalker]

Jaroth Corbett, on 10 September 2014 - 06:10 AM, said:

Clan equipment is SUPPOSED to be better. WAY better. To quote TROs & all the text from novels would only serve to make this a super long post. I will sum it up with one line that I think encompasses everything:

I won't comment on everything else, but this is wrong to a degree. See, remember when you were playing around in STOCK IS mechs??? Run those against our current clan mechs, and tell me the clan mechs aren't worth 2 or 3 mechs each. The mistake you're making is you're comparing current IS mechs (which are at least Jihad era with the current tech we have, plus weightless slot-less C3i equipment in all of them), against clan mechs.

The clans are portrayed faithfully here. Sure the recent tweaks has made their lasers a bit too hot, but they still retain the spirit of how a clan mech should fight, and what it is strong at.

You don't believe me, get into a private match with me, in my stock HBK-4SP, against your SCR, or NVA. Run any configuration you want. (Warning, you might have too much fun running a proper stock v stock game XD)

The other advantage clan mechs had was the pod system, allowing them to replace entire sections on a mech in a matter of hours, and customize the mech for each seperate drop quickly. While IS mechs had to have their sections torn, and rebuilt from the ground up to change or modify the weapons in them. Sometimes the mech would have to be taken back to the manufacturing plant to be rebuilt pretty much. All of which costs a fortune compared to swapping pods.

[Ronsu]

1. Bring back repair costs
2. Make Clan gear holy-****-thats-expensive type special gear
3. Problem solved

What I mean: Make repairing clan gear so expensive that you lose c-bills if you lose a fight (or even your mech in a winning battle). Then you'd have to make money with trial mechs.

RISK vs REWARD

Then its YOUR choice if you want to play with cheaper IS equiptment or Clan tech.

[CyclonerM]

CN9 ACE PILOT, on 10 September 2014 - 06:25 PM, said:

However the downside always was the heat, i tried to explain to many people not to attempt to play the poke game against them, because it's a loosing battle, you have to get in close and use their only true flaw against them. Get in close, survive the initial burst, take down their torso/arm with the most weapons before it starts back up or blast its CT. At close range, the damage differential drops from 291.6% to the original 57% which is a much more manageable number, given the heat will make them slow down fire rate, or risk shutting down.

Exactly! Clan weapons need to stay on target for more time, and this reflects the typical Clan trials fought in an open ground, while IS 'Mechs deal their damage more quickly, and are better for hit and run and guerrilla warfare. This is how you should fight Just tell it to all the noobs screaming OP..

[IraqiWalker]

Ronsu, on 11 September 2014 - 02:13 AM, said:

1. Bring back repair costs
2. Make Clan gear holy-****-thats-expensive type special gear
3. Problem solved

What I mean: Make repairing clan gear so expensive that you lose c-bills if you lose a fight (or even your mech in a winning battle). Then you'd have to make money with trial mechs.

RISK vs REWARD

Then its YOUR choice if you want to play with cheaper IS equipment or Clan tech.

That has literally little to no impact on most players. All you'll do is make clan mechs inaccessible to new players, and cause more cries of P2W. It also doesn't impact CW. No one will go into a competitive fight with a mech that is weak. Otherwise our tourney matches wouldn't feature the same 4 or 5 mechs over and over. Balancing clan mechs in ways that don't matter during a fight is useless. Even now, the high prices on clan weaponry, and equipment, aren't making them anymore balanced against IS equipment.

R&R would be fun, but not even IS mechs would be fielded that well. A SINGLE Endo-Steel Gyro costs 20K C-Bills to repair. If you lose a leg, even empty, that's at least 60K+ in repairs. Work that over an entire mech, and no one will field anything that isn't running stock, or downgraded, or trial mechs that they don't need to repair.

PGI just needs to stop the dumb sledgehammer-first-then-scalpel approach to balance.

[Bulvar Jorgensson]

Let me add my thoughts to this debate.

Balancing weapon systems should be done prior to release, Nerf batting anything once you have let the product out there causes players to say HEY--LEAVE MY WEAPON ALONE...that being said I do not think PGI have the test base to get this correct prior to going live and like all online games players will gravitate to what gives them the best advantage, which in turn means Nerf-bat.

Constantly tweeking with weapon systems/heat generation limits all aspects of the game, due to player perception and game mechanics...
eg. I have a Nova it has 12 Energy slots....it come stock with 12 ERMed lasers......I want to be an ALPHA player, WRONG....

The Nova should be able to fire the lasers it has in banks of 4 twin linked lasers with a full 3 laser set recycle that does not cause the mech to hit 98% heat...it is built round this principle and should play out this way...you fire more, you fry.
How can this be achieved...give it the perk/quirk that allows this on the mech chassis, leave the lasers as is it is how the mech chassis uses the lasers that changes the laser output.

This PGI can do on all of its mechs...from IS through to CLAN.

On the receiving end of this any mech pilot worth their salt would disengage, find cover, attempt to flank, or gun it out if he felt he could slice off a limb or 2.

And this is were MWO fails......we have no proper tactical game...we have a small sandbox, I include even the bigger maps in this, where we commit ourselves to Solaris type matches, not tactical warfare in Mechs.

If you know the enemy out ranges you, you look to the terrain to limit that advantage, objectives need to be defended and captured....mission objective need to be set and achieved....NOT just a BALL UP and ROLL round.

This game fails because it is not a Tactical Mech warfare online game but a glorified CALL of DUTY in robots.

I posted something a while back asking for tactical elements to be introduced, most of the posts said I like to drop into my mech, run around shooting my opponents knowing that a match takes 15 mins, and if I die I can just log out and go find another match.

If that is the constant in this game then Weapon/mech nerfs will be a constant issue.

Oh and I constantly hear Comp play being used as a reference...Comp play should never be used as a point of reference for balancing Online games, as Comp player will and do seek out every advantage they can to WIN no matter what the cost LONG TERM, I know first hand how other online games became so Comp player focused it was lousy to play as anything other than one type of choice.

How can this be fixed for MWO.....it is hard to do, but given all the weight class, weapon types, individual mechs, consumables, it could be done, but the question is will it be done.

Edited by Bulvar Jorgensson, 11 September 2014 - 03:12 AM.

[Jaroth Corbett]

IraqiWalker, on 11 September 2014 - 02:45 AM, said:

PGI just needs to stop the dumb sledgehammer-first-then-scalpel approach to balance.

THANK YOU!!!!!

"What was that sound?"

"A noob cries out for justice my lord!"

"Bring me my nerfhammer!"

"What will you do my lord?"

"I will make the Clans weapons hotter, increase the beam duration, reduce the range & slow the discharge speed of one of the most famous weapons in the universe making it so laughable that anyone can just sidestep it as if we were in the Matrix!"

"All at once?"

*brings hammer down*

"NERF OF FURY!"

[IraqiWalker]

Jaroth Corbett, on 11 September 2014 - 04:01 AM, said:

THANK YOU!!!!!

"What was that sound?"

"A noob cries out for justice my lord!"

"Bring me my nerfhammer!"

"What will you do my lord?"

"I will make the Clans weapons hotter, increase the beam duration, reduce the range & slow the discharge speed of one of the most famous weapons in the universe making it so laughable that anyone can just sidestep it as if we were in the Matrix!"

"All at once?"

*brings hammer down*

"NERF OF FURY!"

It's funny, until you realize that's probably what went down in there.