14 replies to this topic

[Pjwned]

Before reading on further, just know that the 20% speed loss is not even a confirmed change, or at least not yet, though personally I think it should happen and I'm expecting that it will.

Lately I've been wondering how exactly the proposed 20% speed loss would work when a clan mech's side torso is destroyed; I actually tweeted Russ about this just earlier but he simply said "this change doesn't exist yet," and I don't really blame him for saying only that so I want to have a more in-depth discussion here because I find it really interesting.

As far as I can tell there are 2 main ways of going about implementing a 20% speed loss, and 1 method has more consequences (if I understand correctly) than the other.

1. Simply putting an 80% cap on the mech's speed, sort of similar to how losing a leg works where you don't lose agility but you can only move so fast because having only 1 leg hampers your mech quite a bit. An example of this would be a hypothetical clan mech with 100 KPH top speed, it loses its side torso, and now it can only go 80 KPH but the mech speedometer makes it clear that you could be going faster under normal circumstances much like how a legged light mech could be going much faster than 40 KPH.

2. Reducing the mech's top speed, which as far as I understand is directly tied to things like torso twisting, turn speed, acceleration & deceleration, etc. An example of this would be a hypothetical clan mech with 100 KPH top speed, it loses its side torso, and now 80 KPH is its max speed period with no green portion on the speedometer telling you that you could be going faster.

Assuming I am correct about these 2 solutions (which I'm pretty sure I am) I think #2 should be the solution that's used to penalize clan mech side torso loss because destroying a part of the engine is different than being speed capped by a lost leg, and it should work differently from a mechanic standpoint due to that; it's also an issue of a speed cap possibly not being good enough. This means a more drastic effect than some people might have expected or are expecting, but it seems pretty fair and not overly punishing for losing 20% of your engine, and additionally this would clearly be enough of a penalty so as to not increase the heatsink penalty even more or anything like that.

I do understand that currently nothing like solution #2 happens in-game since everything else that affects a mech's speed simply slows it down (obstacles, hill climbing, etc.) or the speed is hard capped due to losing a leg. This makes it a little bit harder to campaign for such a change since PGI would need to put more work into it than otherwise, and there may be technical limitations that seem easy to get around but are actually not for whatever reason, but I still think reducing the mech's top speed is the proper solution when all things are considered.

I am somewhat expecting a tsunami of tears because of this proposal.

Edited by Pjwned, 18 March 2015 - 01:53 PM.

[El Bandito]

IMO, anything that damages the engine should negatively affect the engine's capability to accelerate, decelerate, twist, turn, walk, run, heat reduction etc... ...still better than outright death.

Edited by El Bandito, 17 March 2015 - 10:22 PM.

[Nayru]

As long as getting nicked in the dead torso doesn't slow you to an absolute crawl, like with the legs.

If that happens, I will flip my ****.

[One Medic Army]

El Bandito, on 17 March 2015 - 10:21 PM, said:

IMO, anything that damages the engine should negatively affect the engine's capability to accelerate, decelerate, twist, turn, walk, run, heat reduction etc... ...still better than outright death.

Some day, we will have penalties for critting out someone's engine.

Some day...

Edited by One Medic Army, 17 March 2015 - 10:24 PM.

[Malleus011]

Implementing proper engine crits for IS and Clans alike would go a long way towards addressing this ...

[Pjwned]

Nayru, on 17 March 2015 - 10:23 PM, said:

As long as getting nicked in the dead torso doesn't slow you to an absolute crawl, like with the legs.

If that happens, I will flip my ****.

Absolutely agreed, that stunlock mechanic with the legs is garbage and needs to be removed already as well.

Malleus011, on 17 March 2015 - 10:32 PM, said:

Implementing proper engine crits for IS and Clans alike would go a long way towards addressing this ...

Yeah I can see that and agree with it, though simply applying such penalties on side torso loss (which means the engine is critted out anyways) also works about as well with perhaps less work needed.

[Pjwned]

El Bandito, on 17 March 2015 - 10:21 PM, said:

IMO, anything that damages the engine should negatively affect the engine's capability to accelerate, decelerate, twist, turn, walk, run, heat reduction etc... ...still better than outright death.

Well, if the speed was simply capped it would still affect walking and running and maybe something else, it just wouldn't affect other things like torso twisting since losing a leg doesn't affect that and capping the speed is how a lost leg works. I do think other functions like torso twisting should be affected though since it would a) make sense and b) be properly balanced.

[Armorine]

I don't expect they'll ever apply this to IS. Std engines don't occupy the st at all. I'd be pretty upset if they did. I'm all for a small speech reduction and I love option 2. It's plays to the lore and is something I can get entirely behind

[Gyrok]

Pjwned, on 18 March 2015 - 01:57 PM, said:

Well, if the speed was simply capped it would still affect walking and running and maybe something else, it just wouldn't affect other things like torso twisting since losing a leg doesn't affect that and capping the speed is how a lost leg works. I do think other functions like torso twisting should be affected though since it would a) make sense and be properly balanced.

I disagree, how is kicking a crippled mech while it is already down "balancing" anything?

I mean, present to me a scenario where a mech that does not lose a ST for 3 waves of CW is effected by this change? Present to me a scenario where someone who gets their ST clipped early by turning a bad corner is justified by this penalty?

I see no point in this, and feel it goes completely the opposite direction from balance. I do not expect to see it implemented to be completely honest, I expect to see another round of testing, and I think most of the nerf herding crowd like yourselves will be shocked to see just how even it turns out to be under proper testing circumstances. In fact, the IS may turn out to be a tad too strong. When the chips are done falling.

Hopefully we get some good testing, and great information out of the future chain of events. Either way, there are other things that need to be looked at before this is even mentioned as coming into play. All IS quirks would have to be removed and reworked from the ground up to rebalance against clans at that point among lots of other things that would need adjusting.

Armorine, on 18 March 2015 - 03:18 PM, said:

I don't expect they'll ever apply this to IS. Std engines don't occupy the st at all. I'd be pretty upset if they did. I'm all for a small speech reduction and I love option 2. It's plays to the lore and is something I can get entirely behind

I imagine they will, I should be able to crit your open CT STD engine as well as you can "pseudo fake crit" my CXL ST. I should also be able to crit your open ST XL engine without having to remove the entire ST.

After all, fair is fair.

Edited by Gyrok, 18 March 2015 - 03:20 PM.

[CrushLibs]

PGI should shrink the clan mechs side torso then the MD dies soooo fast its redick

[KraftySOT]

As if theres not already threads about this topic....heres another one.

[Pjwned]

Gyrok, on 18 March 2015 - 03:20 PM, said:

I disagree, how is kicking a crippled mech while it is already down "balancing" anything?

Because 20% heatsink loss when losing 20% of your engine is not enough of a penalty.

Quote

I mean, present to me a scenario where a mech that does not lose a ST for 3 waves of CW is effected by this change? Present to me a scenario where someone who gets their ST clipped early by turning a bad corner is justified by this penalty?

I'm not seeing how this is a very good argument, one person played well and the other didn't. Obviously if you're good enough to not lose your side torso then you shouldn't be penalized as if you did, and the opposite applies as well.

Quote

I see no point in this, and feel it goes completely the opposite direction from balance. I do not expect to see it implemented to be completely honest, I expect to see another round of testing, and I think most of the nerf herding crowd like yourselves will be shocked to see just how even it turns out to be under proper testing circumstances. In fact, the IS may turn out to be a tad too strong. When the chips are done falling.

The 20% heatsink loss has been in for a while and PGI obviously has some decent data on it by now, so I'm confident that if they're considering a 20% speed loss at this point then it's very likely for a good reason backed up by good data.

Quote

Hopefully we get some good testing, and great information out of the future chain of events. Either way, there are other things that need to be looked at before this is even mentioned as coming into play. All IS quirks would have to be removed and reworked from the ground up to rebalance against clans at that point among lots of other things that would need adjusting.

This is a core issue that needs to be addressed before other changes are made though, what other related issues have a higher priority? Additionally, while I agree IS quirks might need to be adjusted, saying they would need to be "removed and reworked from the ground up" is a pretty big exaggeration and it seems like you don't understand that quirks were implemented (on both sides now) so that inherently lower tier mechs would be worth bringing over other mechs within the same tech tree.

Quote

I imagine they will, I should be able to crit your open CT STD engine as well as you can "pseudo fake crit" my CXL ST. I should also be able to crit your open ST XL engine without having to remove the entire ST.

After all, fair is fair.

I agree that engine crits should affect all mechs in a reasonable manner.

KraftySOT, on 18 March 2015 - 03:44 PM, said:

As if theres not already threads about this topic....heres another one.

I realize there are a number of threads already, but most of them and the posts within are simply complaining or supporting the idea, meanwhile I'm trying to discuss the mechanics of it.

[Gyrok]

How can you say that the data they have is sufficient when 12 mans stomp pubs on the clan borders 80%+ of the drops?

That is not data, it is seal clubbing. Hence the progress clans have made *in spite of* superior advantages on some IS mechs.

Also, LOL at both sides have quirks. No, IS has quirks, clans have a shaft shoved up their backsides with quirks written on it with a sharpie. Not same/same.

[Pjwned]

Gyrok, on 18 March 2015 - 04:27 PM, said:

How can you say that the data they have is sufficient when 12 mans stomp pubs on the clan borders 80%+ of the drops?

That is not data, it is seal clubbing. Hence the progress clans have made *in spite of* superior advantages on some IS mechs.

Because your "data" is not reliable while PGI's data is, or at least an order of magnitude more reliable.

Quote

Also, LOL at both sides have quirks. No, IS has quirks, clans have a shaft shoved up their backsides with quirks written on it with a sharpie. Not same/same.

I didn't say they were perfect, although you seem to be looking at some of the lame weapon quirks and ignoring literally everything else, and also that those quirks are iterative meaning they're likely to change.

[Armorine]

Gyrok, on 18 March 2015 - 03:20 PM, said:

I imagine they will, I should be able to crit your open CT STD engine as well as you can "pseudo fake crit" my CXL ST. I should also be able to crit your open ST XL engine without having to remove the entire ST.

After all, fair is fair.

How so? If your hitting opened armor I'm dead already once you've cut through structure. What's pseaudo fake about it ? Your whole side is gone. Weapons and all. Poof. Destroyed is destroyed. You seem to forget on the IS XLs ST destruction is death.