52 replies to this topic

[ShadowWolf Kell]

1453 R, on 05 July 2015 - 08:03 AM, said:

We have a chance to fix things that actually need fixing. This is our one shot to get the worst mis-scaled 'Mechs back in the shop for an overhaul...and you folks are wasting it on Shadow Hawks and Grasshoppers.

Ya know, I've never once thought my SHDs were too high. The only gripe I've ever had about them is the LT mounted ballistic port blocking my view.

Maybe these folks should go back to playing Hello Kitty Online instead of Mech Warrior Online.

[Tarogato]

The problem with the Grasshopper, is that it is already the smallest heavy mech, technically. (well, aside from the Jagermech, which is only barely smaller)

This is according to profile, of course - how much space the mech takes up on your screen and therefore how easy it is to actually hit it. If we shrunk the Grasshopper, it would become ridiculously underscaled in regards to its overall profile.

[El Bandito]

Tarogato, on 05 July 2015 - 04:44 PM, said:

The problem with the Grasshopper, is that it is already the smallest heavy mech, technically. (well, aside from the Jagermech, which is only barely smaller)

This is according to profile, of course - how much space the mech takes up on your screen and therefore how easy it is to actually hit it. If we shrunk the Grasshopper, it would become ridiculously underscaled in regards to its overall profile.

Grasshoppers are very easy to spot, and very easy hit, from my experience. The legs just need to be slightly shorter, and slightly bulkier. That will do the trick.

Edited by El Bandito, 05 July 2015 - 04:53 PM.

[Tarogato]

El Bandito, on 05 July 2015 - 04:50 PM, said:

Grasshoppers are very easy to spot, and very easy hit, from my experience. The legs just need to be slightly shorter, and slightly bulkier. That will do the trick.

So in otherwords, they need to look slightly more like every other mech in the game and help stifle the diversity between different chassis?

[El Bandito]

Tarogato, on 05 July 2015 - 05:08 PM, said:

So in otherwords, they need to look slightly more like every other mech in the game and help stifle the diversity between different chassis?

I know what you mean, but Grasshopper's model is already unique among others. Slightly bulkier but shorter leg is not going to change the fact that people will still recognize it right away, as Grasshopper.

Edited by El Bandito, 05 July 2015 - 05:26 PM.

[Strum Wealh]

Bishop Steiner, on 05 July 2015 - 01:03 PM, said:

Massive and intimidating is not the same as tall. In fact only one even lists the height, and it is a novel quoted, in direct contrast to the stated heights that CGL gives for mechs (8-14 meters).
http://bg.battletech...tlemech-height/

Also taken from the 3025 TRO:
"Ugly and foreboding are two apt descriptions for the Atlas. Though some 'Mechs might be taller and heavier, none have the Atlas' aura. "


Whereas several mechs are canon TT supplement described as noted for their height, like the Executioner, Summoner, Victor, Banshee and Grasshopper.

As for "Massive and intimidating" which is morseo?


Hafthór Júlíus Björnsson at 2.06 m (6'9¨)

or


Manute Bol, at 2.31m ('77")

Just out of curiosity.

Height - along with overall size & mass - is a major factor in being intimidating and/or imposing.

Neither of the individuals would be nearly so (potentially) intimidating if they were, say, 5'2" (1.57 meters) tall & having the same proportions, versus their "full-size" counterpart.

[Tarogato]

El Bandito, on 05 July 2015 - 04:07 PM, said:

I was one of the people who had championed hard for the Grasshopper to be included in game before Black Knight, but even I did not touch the mech when PGI revealed just how tall they made it. I will only buy it if the size is reduced, no ifs, ands, or buts.




Let alone Atlas, Grasshopper is even shorter than Banshee. My sources generally say Atlas is taller than the Banshee. So if Banshee is shorter than Atlas, then Grasshopper should not be of the same height as the Atlas.

Except the Atlas isn't necessarily taller than the Banshee. Using the human figure as a scale reference, and assuming it is average male human height (177cm), we get a height of 15.99m for that Banshee. Experimental Technical Readout: Primitives v.2 notes the Banshee as being one of the largest pre-Star League mechs. The Atlas in the MW4 handbook is stated as only being 13m. In the book Technology of Destruction, the Atlas is stated as being 13m tall. The Battletech book, "Shrapnel", states the Atlas as being 13m.

In this thread, a lead developer of BattleTech states that mechs range 8-14m in height, and the Total Warfare rulebook also states 8-14m. (so if the tallest mechs are 14m, there must be mechs that exist that are taller than the 13m Atlas) Given that our scale reference image exceeds this, we can make any of a number of assumptions. The most obvious being: take the imagery with a grain of salt. The next being, they erred on the side of overscaling because the Banshee is supposed to be about as tall as a mech can get, or the human figure provided is shorter than the average male human height (entirely possible, since many mech pilots would have had to been small people to be able to fit into a number of mechs). The last logical conclusion would be that the Banshee is supposed to be taller than an Atlas. The Grasshopper in the illustration is 13.89m, so it could very well be as tall or taller than an Atlas.

It might be worth noting that the MWO Banshee is 17.55m, taller than the MWO Atlas which is 17.4m. The Grasshopper comes in at about 16.61m. I know this because I can load them up into CryEngine and literally measure the heights of them. PGI has gone along the alternative route (I don't have any sources, but they exist somewhere, I've seen them cited before) that the tallest battlemechs are about the height of Gundams, and Gundams are canonically about 18m.

Edited by Tarogato, 05 July 2015 - 06:54 PM.

[Bishop Steiner]

Strum Wealh, on 05 July 2015 - 06:32 PM, said:

Height - along with overall size & mass - is a major factor in being intimidating and/or imposing.

Neither of the individuals would be nearly so (potentially) intimidating if they were, say, 5'2" (1.57 meters) tall & having the same proportions, versus their "full-size" counterpart.

and anything over 10 meters tall is already tall enough to be intimidating, no?

[MacBeth]

Haha sure wolverine would be terrifying... But a normal man at 5'2 and 200+ pounds of muscle would never be as intimidating as a man who is 6'6 and 300+ pounds of muscle.

Edited by MacBeth, 05 July 2015 - 07:18 PM.

[El Bandito]

Tarogato, on 05 July 2015 - 06:49 PM, said:

Except the Atlas isn't necessarily taller than the Banshee. Using the human figure as a scale reference, and assuming it is average male human height (177cm), we get a height of 15.99m for that Banshee. Experimental Technical Readout: Primitives v.2 notes the Banshee as being one of the largest pre-Star League mechs. The Atlas in the MW4 handbook is stated as only being 13m. In the book Technology of Destruction, the Atlas is stated as being 13m tall. The Battletech book, "Shrapnel", states the Atlas as being 13m.

So what does ETR say about Atlas' height? Each BT games/novels use different heights, so unless you quote exactly the same source mentioning both mechs' heights...

MechCommander 1 manual states Atlas is 17 meters tall, while MW3 states it is 13 meters tall. There is also a mention of Atlas being 1 meter shorter than that of a Gundam, which is 18 meters tall. So that also confirms that Atlas is 17 meters tall, which will make it taller than the 15.99 meters in the picture you figured out.

Edited by El Bandito, 05 July 2015 - 07:37 PM.

[MacBeth]

The link Bishop provided us has a dev saying taller mechs were 13 to 14 meters tall, so it's probably safe to say the Atlas is 13.

[Strum Wealh]

El Bandito, on 05 July 2015 - 07:24 PM, said:

So what does ETR say about Atlas' height? Each BT games/novels use different heights, so unless you quote exactly the same source mentioning both mechs' heights...

MechCommander 1 manual states Atlas is 17 meters tall, while MW3 states it is 13 meters tall. There is also a mention of Atlas being 1 meter shorter than that of a Gundam, which is 18 meters tall. So that also confirms that Atlas is 17 meters tall, which will make it taller than the 15.99 meters in the picture you figured out.

What is the original source for the height of the Atlas in reference to a Gundam?

Also, it matters which gundam is used as the reference:

• The RX-78 Gundam has a head height of 18.0 meters, with an overall height of 18.5 meters.
  
• The RX-93 Nu Gundam has a head height of 22.0 meters, with an overall height of 23.0 meters.
  
• The LM312V04 Victory Gundam has a head height of 15.2 meters.
  
• The GF13-017NJ Shining Gundam has an overall height of 16.2 meters.
  
• The XXXG-01W Wing Gundam has an overall height of 16.3 meters.

So, "as tall as a Gundam" could be anywhere between 15 meters and 23 meters & "a meter shorter than a Gundam" could be anywhere between 14 meters and 22 meters.

Edited by Strum Wealh, 06 July 2015 - 12:15 AM.

[Tarogato]

El Bandito, on 05 July 2015 - 07:24 PM, said:

So what does ETR say about Atlas' height? Each BT games/novels use different heights, so unless you quote exactly the same source mentioning both mechs' heights...

MechCommander 1 manual states Atlas is 17 meters tall, while MW3 states it is 13 meters tall. There is also a mention of Atlas being 1 meter shorter than that of a Gundam, which is 18 meters tall. So that also confirms that Atlas is 17 meters tall, which will make it taller than the 15.99 meters in the picture you figured out.

ETR doesn't specify the heights, it merely makes the passing mention about the Banshee as being one of the largest.

TRO:3039 does however say, "... and although there are taller ’Mechs on the field, none of them have the sheer presence of the Atlas." In 3039, what mechs could have been taller than an Atlas? The Banshee would be a prime candidate, for sure.

Now, what confuses me, is the connection between battlemechs and gundams/mobile suits. I don't know anything about Gundam lore, and I'm curious what ties the two together (and perhaps thus leads to this discrepancy in stated battlemech heights).

[xengk]

Height coupled with shoulder weapon and JJ tend to be a good combo, the Grasshopper is fast replacing Orion as my favourite heavy. Meanwhile a tall mech with waist weapon are generally hated; trebuchet, victor, banshee, even if they have JJ.

Someone need to pull up that TRO mech heigh chart again; where a commando is half the height of an atlas.

[Navy Sixes]

Tarogato, on 05 July 2015 - 08:11 PM, said:

what confuses me, is the connection between battlemechs and gundams/mobile suits.

What confuses me is the connection between scale in lore and scale in an online shooter/simulation. I get that some are having a discussion about an interesting topic, and hey, I'm reading what people are posting because I'm interested, too. So long as we all understand that when we finally come back to talking about MW:O, whatever one line in a 20-year-old and out-of-print tech manual reads has absolutely no bearing whatsoever on a balanced and entertaining MW:O. They don't dwell on scale in lore because it really didn't matter in TT. It matters now, and everyone knows it. That's why we don't see lights in MW:O scaled like mechs 20-tons heavier. No one would run them. But mediums?

Also confusing is the way some have confused "scale" with "proportion." I don't want a "reproportioned" Shadowhawk (shorter but fatter). I want a "rescaled" Shadowhawk. That means that in whatever percentage it's height is reduced, its with and depth will also be reduced. So that means smaller hitboxes from all directions (including width), making it a more viable mech. Some like the height of the Shawk as is. I think an overall say, 10% reduction of scale -with the shawk sized more like a Blackjack or Hunchback- would be a more than acceptable trade off. I don't know anyone who says, "I like my Hunchback... I just wish it was scaled larger so I could get more out of the shoulder-mounted hardpoints."

Also confusing is the way some accuse others of voting for mechs that "don't need it" while ignoring mechs "that do." I don't know what else is to be expected (unless you honestly expect people to just take all the Nova pilots' words on the subject). I can only speak to mechs I run and run against. You say, "Nova needs to be rescaled." I have no doubt you're right, but so does the Shadowhawk. That's because...

...I'm finally confused by why we're being asked to argue with each other over which mediums need to be reduced in scale. PGI and this community know full well that ALL MEDIUMS NEED TO BE REDUCED IN SCALE. Turning a matter of game balance into a stupid contest is bad. Nothing good will come of this, no matter who "wins" or "loses."

[Escef]

El Bandito, on 05 July 2015 - 04:07 PM, said:

I was one of the people who had championed hard for the Grasshopper to be included in game before Black Knight, but even I did not touch the mech when PGI revealed just how tall they made it. I will only buy it if the size is reduced, no ifs, ands, or buts.

Your loss.

[El Bandito]

Escef, on 06 July 2015 - 01:21 AM, said:

Your loss.

It is never my loss when I refuse to buy unsatisfactory product. If anything else, it is PGI's loss.

[Thorqemada]

If anything a higher Mechs find less cover, has a bigger silhouette to hit, to peek over a ridge height is irrelevant - relevant is ECM/JJ yes/no and hardpoint placement, of course some Mechs also have relevant Quirks.

Edited by Thorqemada, 06 July 2015 - 03:03 AM.

[LordBraxton]

I don't understand how people can claim 'height does not matter.' Gun position determins how much you expose to shoot, but general height determines how much cover you can use on the map. The shorter you are, the more viable cover you have. Avoiding Lurms in a Grasshopper isn't easy. Avoiding Lurms in a hunchback is simple.

Edited by LordBraxton, 06 July 2015 - 03:17 AM.

[MeiSooHaityu]

I think its a combination of height and weapons.

Yes taller mechs have less effective cover, but we also aren't talking about drastic height changes. If you are going to shrink the height of a Grasshopper, you're going to shrink it a tiny bit. It will still be Heavy mech tall. It's not like that will effect it's variety of usable cover much. After all, a Grasshopper isn't going to be shrunk to the size of a Hunchback.

If a mech is tall but has high hard points, it can still hill hump and conceal itself with most existing heavy mech cover. It can fire behind that cover in relative safety.

I think worst case is taller mech with low hard points and no JJs. Now it has limited cover, can't fire over cover, and can't jump up cover to fire. Those mechs are much trickier to use.

P.S. Had an ongoing argument about the Cata 0XP being a good ECM mech. I was trying to defend it due to it's durability, ECM sneaky-ness, and decent enough load out. The main argument against it was basically what I said above (low weapons and no JJs). I had figured that the durability quirks and ECM made up for it, but many felt different.

Point is, If even ECM and big durability buffs still doesn't make a low weapon and no JJ mech any good in many players eyes, that may be the bigger issue than just plain height. The Cataphract isn't that tall for a heavy, but if it was taller, but had high weapon hard points, would it be as bad in many player's eyes.

TL;DR
That's why I feel height alone isn't the sole indicator. Height differences are going to vary a small bit within class, but hard point height often determines how much of your mech's height you have to expose. Its why both should be considered together.