169 replies to this topic

[Sesambrot]

Karl Streiger, on 29 May 2012 - 05:35 AM, said:

They won't be able to dominate IS-Players when sticking to Honor Rules 1...

You mean IF they stick to honor-rules, which is highly unlikely even for most vets, as pretty much everybody plays to win... ...simple fact.

Karl Streiger, on 29 May 2012 - 05:35 AM, said:

The system may discourage team play for clans...but when the invasion moves on they can switch to less strict rules - allowing them to work together.

Didn't we all agree previously that teamwork should be a big fat NoNo for Clanplayers, as a balanceconsideration?

Karl Streiger, on 29 May 2012 - 05:35 AM, said:

However the result maybe that only the most experienced players will run successful a clan carrier ...but shouldn't clan players be the death incarnate?

Definitely not, unless you wanna break gameplay and balance that badly...

[CaveMan]

Sesambrot, on 29 May 2012 - 05:29 AM, said:

The problem here is that all you're doing is to make the metagame less fun for clan-players as you make them grind much longer, but they'll still be able to dominate IS-players in combat. So all you're doing is to slow them down in their progress, you actually don't prevent them from fighting "dishonorably".

Presumably you'll still have to pay for repairs and to replace damaged equipment, as well as to buy new 'Mechs (otherwise what would be the point of having an ingame economy?). If, as I suggested above, you make Clan gear waaaay more expensive to buy and repair than IS or Star League gear (and make Clan players start out with a Star League 'Mech and equipment and work their way up to an OmniMech and Clan-tech weapons), then Clan players who don't play "by the rules" aren't going to be able to maintain their pimped-out Timberwolves. Since repairs will be expensive too, you can't even grind your way up by long hours if you're dishonorable, because you'll be too busy patching up your 'Mech and buying ammo after each match.

All this should be laid out up front when you start a Clan character too (and no switching to IS for that character, ever). Rolling Clan should be the game's "hard mode".

[Dymitry]

Personally I have the bad feeling that when the Clans enter the fray, clantech will simply be made available to everyone, sooner(paying?) or later and it will be very expensive, again milking players. To implement a system where there are 2 different kind of players looks really hard and counter-productive.

From the page someone has linked..."How zellbrigen is interpreted depends not only on the individual, but their parent Clan as a whole. At one end of the spectrum, the rules are strictly followed, the only exception being when fighting bandits, pirates or the most hated of enemies. At the opposite end, zellbrigen is figuratively "thrown out the airlock" and used only against other Clan warriors, and even then only when there is an advantage over them. In between are varying levels of adherence; for example, zellbrigen is followed unless circumstances dictated otherwise, such as being outnumbered or thinking one could get away with breaking it."

Regarding zellbrigen it should be up to the various clans to implement it/enforce it on members. I would love to see inner sphere freebirths behaving like civilized warriors, regardless of the faction they are fighting for, but I know for once that it will not happen. More rules == more exploits == more freebirth cheaters.

Edited by Dymitry, 29 May 2012 - 05:57 AM.

[Sesambrot]

What Dymitry said...

Besides, Caveman;
At that point, you have actually made the punishment gamebreaking, which is undesirable in any case.

[Dymitry]

Caverman, and everyone who shares his concerns...Rest assured that true clanners will take special satisfaction into destroying whoever straps himself in an Omnimech, or define himself Clan, or sports an unearned bloodname just to sport an attitude on the battlefield. Omnimechs, as the Clans and the Clanners, Wardens or Crusaders, have been created and bred to fulfil a holy purpose.

[Roland]

The clans will take some serious balancing in order to incorporate them into the game in a way that isn't just a bunch of new mechs and weapons... which, frankly, would be fine to me anyway.

You aren't really going to be able to enforce most of the more subtle rules of clan behavior. Some league environments managed to do it, but even there it was pretty loose. Folks playing mechwarrior aren't clanners... they are folks playing a video game. They aren't genetically bred to have superior reflexes and junk. They don't really care about honor.

Ultimately, I suspect that the clans are going to be introduced as a bunch of new tech, and that tech will be extremely expensive.

Clans will be able to purchase clan tech cheaper than the IS units can, but would still be paying a lot for it. They also would be paying extremely high prices for IS tech. So, basically, the balancing point becomes price. If you want to play a clan, then you can get a slight price reduction on clan tech.... but the tradeoff is that you really don't have access to ANY "cheap" tech. You're forced to choose between expensive, and really freaking expensive.

Seems like it'd be a fairly straightforward balancing system which would end up being easily enforcable. Because, honestly, I do not think that anything that tries to tell people how to roleplay their mechwarrior character is really going to work.

[Dymitry]

Yup...and with artillery, naval strikes and whatnot, taking out your timberwolf that costs as much a lance of IS mediums may become really expensive. I would love deeper role playing in the game, as the beauty of battletech is as much in the lore as it is in the machines, and people on the forum show that constantly, but, honestly, if we want the game to thrive we will have to make do with galaxies of mum-financed kiddos who roam around in timber wolves shooting at every commando out there..."y3aH p0Wn3d, sNip3r 98" etc...until the game and battletech benefits, I am ok with it.

[PANZERBUNNY]

CaveMan, on 29 May 2012 - 04:32 AM, said:

The main problem I see here is your system is really vulnerable to griefers. If somebody jumps into a match and starts shooting all their teammates' targets just to keep other people from gaining honor and p!ss them off there's nothing the victims can do.

You can't force people to roleplay. All you can do is either restrict access to the Clans to people who would roleplay in the first place (which would cause all kinds of crying in the forums) or nerf Clan equipment so it's not unbalanced (which would cause all kinds of crying in the forums).

Clan eccentricities isn't roleplaying. It just simply is.

With that raionale we may as well give each side complete access to the full list of weapons and equipment regradless if they had them in lore.

Making both sides essentially red VS blue would be a terrible idea.

If people want to play Clan and have no idea what they are about, they'll have to learn. Expecting to jump into this game and whine that certain factions may have certain play mechanics is fairly childish.

It isn't forcing Rping, it's enforcing aspects of Battletech which make it Battletech.

With that said, any IS mech with Clan Technology should give their normal kill bonus if attacked by a more powerful Clan opponent. Killing your lessers gives significantly less expereince and C-bills. (If the Clans even have C-Bills. I can see them having and Honour currency.)

[Engineering]

Instead of Zelbrigen they should bring in a bidding system like the mercs. You bid X mech and if your below the cutoff your in otherwise your stuck playing against other clanners. That way the clan forces would actually have to use skill to beat the IS forces rather than just ROLF Stomping them in Daishi uber mod.

Make standard varients count for underbidding the custom varients and have either a bv system or some other weight system that calculates which mechs are better than others and voila. I bid using my Stormcrow Prime you bid your Daishi uber mod. I play against the IS and you get to play the other 50 guys with Daishi uber mods on the clan homeworlds.

upsides are IS forces will face inferior clan mechs forcing the clanners to actually be the elite warriors they are supposed to be to win. We have fewer idiots who want to stomp on the IS by gaming the system in the clans. And we get to see something other than the most uber long range mechs if we play against the clans.

And yeah we can also have a game mode for those IS forces that want to be stomped on by the clans... yeah... I can see that working out real well for the clanners... 4 hour wait times for games anyone?

[Roland]

PANZERBUNNY, on 29 May 2012 - 08:05 AM, said:

Clan eccentricities isn't roleplaying. It just simply is.

With that raionale we may as well give each side complete access to the full list of weapons and equipment regradless if they had them in lore.

Making both sides essentially red VS blue would be a terrible idea.

If people want to play Clan and have no idea what they are about, they'll have to learn. Expecting to jump into this game and whine that certain factions may have certain play mechanics is fairly childish.

It isn't forcing Rping, it's enforcing aspects of Battletech which make it Battletech.

With that said, any IS mech with Clan Technology should give their normal kill bonus if attacked by a more powerful Clan opponent. Killing your lessers gives significantly less expereince and C-bills. (If the Clans even have C-Bills. I can see them having and Honour currency.)

I just think you're going to have a hard time enforcing things like "honor", which was the driving force behind most Clan behavior.

[Aegis Kleais]

Forcing roleplaying on a consumer is a MISERABLE idea.

Hopefully, down the line, the ability to setup one's own games with such rules can be added to sate such a request, but til then forcing a player to abide by those guidelines sounds like all different types of a bad idea.

[wwiiogre]

I am with Caveman on this one. There will more than likely be an Honor Currency for Clanners. There will be bidding for missions, with lowest bidder winning the mission vs. IS. While the rest of the clanners shoot each other cause they are not playing by the rules of the clan. It takes until 3058 until clan parts can be put on Inner Sphere mechs. Using a clan mech that you captured/salvaged will probably not be possible since there is no salvage in the game at this point.

And did you notice Matthew Craig's comment about invading other peoples games with Clan mechs. Meaning you and your merc corps are fighting a nice battle vs. the Draconis combine, about half your mechs and theirs are scrap and then drops two stars of Clan mechs challenging both of you for possession of the planet. Ohhhh baby, can't wait for this.

I am hoping that clan players will have to start out in 2nd hand clan mechs and old star league variants. Then work their way up the totem pole.

chris

[RandomToon]

The answer seems easy to me - allow both sides to have access to both sets of tech.

There are numerous cases of IS using clan tech - there is no reason to restrict it since IS has access to a lot of it (and SLDF era stuff that is held by Comstar is pretty powerful too). Also, what is known as "clan tech" is reserved for clan frontline forces; the clans actually use LOTS of "IS" technology in their garrison and Solahma forces that actually makes up a bulk of their total force (it was a sticking point in the series when the Smoke Jaguar home world was destroyed by IS forces). There are also stories where commanders would bid those forces in the batchall since it was less resource to risk a Marauder than a MadCat.

The real question is, once it becomes available why would you NOT use it since it is almost always the better choice?

[DerMaulwurf]

You could enforce an honor code by penalizing people who don't comply in terms of rewards (e.g. attacks by teammates "tag" their target; unless said target attacked you, you get reward penalty for attacking them). Combine that with high repair costs should be effective enough.

However, I'd prefer it if the repair costs were kept and the rewards were adjusted based on bidding. Meaning that if you insist to bring your custom Daishi, you'll only get a fraction of the reward you'd gotten in a Fire Moth. So Clan players could increase the payout by bidding down and couldn't sustain bringing Assault mechs all the time. It also makes sense that your clan will notice your actions more if you crush the freebirths in a Fire Moth and reward you more for it.

[Woska]

While I do agree with the spirit of this idea, it's also important to consider when to end this requirement. With the Inner Sphere fighting tooth and nail, the Clans had to abandon the traditional honour rules pretty quick. The superior technology was also largely copied by the Inner Sphere, mostly negating the advantage.

So if you enforce single combat, when do you stop doing it?

[Tannhauser Gate]

Maybe.. which is alot more than I can say for past ideas of this nature.

There have been countless threads lamenting that 75% of players want to play Clanners but only 1% want to actually observe zell or play wth some kind of Clan rules of engagement. The answer has always been that you cant force people to roleplay.

Using game mechanics to reward people (who chose to be clanneers) for clan-style fighting is a step in the right direction. Youre still going to have people howling about how unfair it is and they will find some way around it.. most just want clan tech and some want the clan names but verrry few want to fight like clanners especially if it means losing battles.

[Name54678]

There should be two sets of rules. One for playing as IS and another for playing as clanner. If you want the advantage of the superior clan technology, you should also be held to the codes of conduct which define the clans. If you behave in a way which does not adhere to clan ethics then you should carry a penalty (reduced loot and experience) with you that gets extended to your clan team mates for associating with you.

Woska does raise a valid point about when to end it (or what about if it should end)? I seem to remember reading somewhere there was once a clan that basically got destroyed because they told the other clans they were going to do things their own way (Wolverine?). Other clans are fanatical and will follow clan law unto death while others seems to see to be more about making c-bills and see the rules more as guidelines.

[CaveMan]

Sesambrot, on 29 May 2012 - 06:11 AM, said:

What Dymitry said...

Besides, Caveman;
At that point, you have actually made the punishment gamebreaking, which is undesirable in any case.

You're going to have to explain how it's gamebreaking.

The rules of the game are explained up front. They're not hidden in any way from the player, so you know what you're getting into. If you play by the rules, everything works fine. If you don't play by the rules, expect to get scr3wed. There's no reason not to play by the rules, unless you just want to be a munchkin and get access to Clan gear without using Clan tactics.

[Kaskelotti]

Maybe not make it a set of rules you must follow when playing as a clanner, but implement a simple honor point system: where you gain honour by fighting honourably and lose honour when not.

Make every clan mech and equipment available for a player when he's met a certain criteria (honor point amount) and when he loses enough honour points, he loses the ability to keep he's higher tier mechs and equipment in a decent shape. I.e. can't purchase gear/mechs in a specified honour "tier"

That is an artificial limit that can't be easily exploited for clan players, though i haven't thought it through yet for the IS players (a bit tipsy atm), but will work on the concept when sober.

Thoughts?

[Furniture]

Personally I think that many of the ideas in the thread are fantastic. It would be awesome to award players who stick with Zell. However, I can't support any punishments for breaking it - you can't force people to roleplay in an online game, and you can't force them to read the fluff if they don't want to.

Another thing that concerns me is that it would seem that many of the players out there will (just like in tabletop) rabidly support Zell as long as it benefits them. It's easy for an Inner Sphere player, which I am in tabletop by the way, to say that Clanners must be forced to use Zell, and then try to quote canon to justify it so that they can simply break it when it is to their advantage. Let's face it, Clanners rarely ever break Zell in tabletop because it is to THEIR benefit to keep it. A Clan mech, which in canon is piloted by a more skilled mechwarrior, will almost always beat an equivalent Inner Sphere mech in a one on one. By fighting only one on one duels, the Clan player doesn't have to worry about the main advantage of Inner Sphere armies, which is numbers.

Looking at canon, it is made clear that Zellbrigen is for Clan on Clan engagements - after the first contact with the Inner Sphere many Clans dropped Zell against dishonorable Inner Sphere opponents who would always break it, reserving the honor of Zell for Clan opponents. There is even a chart in the back of the tabletop rulebook that details every Clan and its views on using Zell, and most of them are not strict adherents and even drop it altogether when fighting the Inner Sphere.

It would seem that the thread is focusing a lot on the idea of Clanners breaking Zellbrigen, but I really don't understand this, because it is almost always the Inner Sphere that breaks it in canon. If you are all so worried about game balance with Clans, the solution is so simple. Instead of forcing people to roleplay Zell (which is not really canon against IS opponents after the intial wave of the invasion for most Clans) or instead of violating fluff by making Clan weapons and tech equal to IS... just change the numbers of mechs involved in a Clan battle. Just like in canon where Clan commanders bid their numbers down to show off that they can defeat greater numbers of enemies, just like on the tabletop where there is BV to balance the armies, why can't we just have a modifier that ensures that whenever a Clan force fights an Inner Sphere force in MWO the Inner Sphere force has twice as many players as the Clan one? For example, if there are 5 Clan players, the Inner Sphere team can field 8 to 12 mechs against them. Numbers will make up for the quality of the individual mechs. If you tip the numbers in favor of the Inner Sphere players, I guarantee you that no sane Clan player will ever willingly break Zell, and you Inner Sphere players can dishonorably take advantage of it to your hearts content.