468 replies to this topic

[FlyingTurtle]

400th reply!

[Gremlich Johns]

FlyingTurtle, on 14 April 2013 - 06:36 AM, said:

400th reply!

actually, you got 401

[Karl Streiger]

MustrumRidcully, on 13 April 2013 - 09:33 AM, said:

I think there would have been two ways

1) Make the stats entirely your own, forgetting the canon stats and stock mechs and just try to restore the spirit of all mechs.
2) Take the canon stats as base, including the heat scale, and then adjust where you need to account for non-random hit location (how about adjusting armour values and ratios between hit locations?), mouse aiming (range penalties from TT don't fit to the behaviour of a mouse, aiming a medium laser at 200m is just as easy or hard as aiming a large laser at 200m) and convergence (single shot damage is worth a lot less in a game with convergence), and tweak further. (How much alpha damage do we want to be possible to make a reasonably paced game? How often do weapons need to shoot to feel "fun"?), always with one goal - make stock mechs still work reasonbly (not optimzied, but reasonbly) well.

Well in the end the results of Opt 1 and Opt 2 would have been the same.

Edited by Karl Streiger, 14 April 2013 - 11:19 PM.

[MustrumRidcully]

Karl Streiger, on 14 April 2013 - 11:19 PM, said:

Well in the end the results of Opt 1 and Opt 2 would have been the same.

Not neccessarily, because if you forget stock mechs, you can end up with 5 ton PPCs and 2 ton Medium Lasers without any problem.

[Karl Streiger]

MustrumRidcully, on 14 April 2013 - 11:54 PM, said:

Not neccessarily, because if you forget stock mechs, you can end up with 5 ton PPCs and 2 ton Medium Lasers without any problem.

I think I see your point.

Similar to the MechCommander system. The weapon weight was based on TT weapon weight plus heat sinks.
The resulting weight was "balanced"...so my Atlas...in Stock a AS7-K was able to carry 4 PPCs and 4 Laser.

With enough time and cross checks every weapon system could be explained and keep the stock mech config for most builds.
Those that would be hard or impossible to realize would not make it - or would have some minor modifications.

If you ask me - to capture the spirit of a Mech is more important than canon stats.

[MustrumRidcully]

Karl Streiger, on 15 April 2013 - 12:22 AM, said:

If you ask me - to capture the spirit of a Mech is more important than canon stats.

Probably, but there is a big appeal to seeing your favorite table top mech configuration come to life in Mechwarrior. And I think itwould be possible without that mech automatically being bad.

But hey, if that's too hard for PGI, 5 ton PPCs and 2 tons Medium Lasers don't sound so bad to me...

[Karl Streiger]

MustrumRidcully, on 15 April 2013 - 05:24 AM, said:

But hey, if that's too hard for PGI, 5 ton PPCs and 2 tons Medium Lasers don't sound so bad to me...

At least you can make the WPPC (W for weak, less capacitors, less heat, less damage and less heat - similar to the not developed LPPC) weighting 5 tons and 2 crits.
And the SMLAS(S for strong, better durable energy translation or other SiFi FU...for more range and damage) but weighting 2 tons and 2 crits

[0I0]

CloaknDagger, on 08 March 2013 - 05:09 PM, said:

Let's see MWO's.record on ignoring canon so far:

1. Doubling Armor

Effect: Weight class balance is destroyed. Light mechs can easily get in a brawl with mechs 5 times their size and beat them with their lag shields. And combined with...

2. Tripling weapon RoF

Effect: Weapon balance is destroyed. Gauss is the only ballistic worth using, all canon designs are way overheated, Energy boats are forced to boat heat sinks.

3. No guidance on SRMs.

Effect: By treating SRMs like Rocket Launchers, They are useless at anything other than point blank. I mean that literally, I can count on one hand the number of times an SRM boat killed me. Every time was at point blank. They literally have no range.

4. Treating ECM like Stealth Armor, AECM, and a regular ECM all at the same time.

Effect: I think you know just how badly this is screwing up the game. ECM doesn't stop missile locks in canon, or reduce detection range.

5. Treating BAP as... a targeting system?

Effect: BAP is supposed to act as a better sensor system. That it does do. But it is also supposed to be a Counter-ECM. Any ECM field it's near is nullified. In here, it... isn't. That's why nobody uses BAP.

6. Streak SRMs always hit.

Effect: SSRMs are only supposed to be perfectly accurate IF you actually get a hit. That is, it's just as accurate as any other weapon, except more missiles hit, and if you miss, the weapon doesn't fire. Instead, we get a weapon that almost never misses, and does tons of damage for low heat and weight. Also it goes great on ECM mechs.

7. Unjammable U/AC-5s

Effect: U/AC-5's still suck.

8. Machineguns not doing 2 damage.

Effect: MGs are useless.

9. Less than Double Double Heat Sinks.

Effect: EVERYTHING past intro tech was designed with DHS in mind. ERPPCs, ERLLs, MRMs, ect.... Effectively reducing heat sinking across the board just ***** them even more than already. Heat was ALREADY A PROBLEM TO BEGIN WITH.

10. No heat scale effects.

Effect: With only "shutdown" and "perfectly fine", there's absolutely no reason not to alpha strike. In TT you would slow down, become less accurate, and maybe blow up with too much heat. NOPE! Not here!


Continue to ignore canon Piranha, I'm sure it will end up just as well as Duke Nukem Forever did.

1. Game would be even faster, and boring, without the x2 armor

2. More armor + higher ROF equal interesting combat. With allot of shutdowns in combat, until you learn how to manage your heat.

3. Either you don't run them(seems so to me), or you have a preternatural level of awareness in that you can track and log(in your brain) every point of damage you have ever taken...EVAR. I don't know(or care) what the cannon/TT mechanics were. I do know that as they areat about a max of 120m-60M is your midrange for SRMS. 60M and below(which I'm assuming is what you consider point blank) is brawl range, and therefore what they seem to excel at. Want more range out of em, run artemis.

4. If you've read any of the posts about there intent behind ECM, all the necessary fixes and balances will be coming out in the next few months.

5. Refer to 4.

6. I've never quite figured out the beef with streaks. I've ran them in lights, and I still prefer to just outmaneuver my opponent.

7. Seems like another issue with not liking the weapon, or not wanting to take the time to master them. I've seen plenty of builds with them that work great. I personaly don't prefer them as it takes allot of concentration(for myself, maybe not others) to run them properly. When done right they can put out a nasty amount of damage.

8. No argument here, there garbage as they are right now. Especially in a game, that favors alphas over tactical weapon usage.

9. I'm not mentally stuck in a game that's almost ten years old, so I always have an issue understanding what people want when I read these posts about how heatsinks should or should not be like.

10. Well this would be interesting, but ultimately would take away from the fast paced combat that the newer community seems to be in favor of. Also if you pref the way TT works, maybe you should hop of the comp and dust of those models.

Your last comment had me loling for a bit. I do get it, I played all the same games, with wolfenstien 3d being my very first FPS. What I like to do as a human being however, is to accept that as "technology" gets better, games change and can accomplish things that they had no hopes of doing 5, 10, 15, and 20 years ago. It can be difficult to accept that as we get older, our reaction times, are just not as fast as a younger player. However, I don't get mad and pull my hair out, and screw WHY GAME NO LIKE IT WAS WHEN ME BE YOUNG!

As a last note, I've taken it on as a personal crusade to go after any post that attacks this game merely because its not like games that it is not. I.E although in the same universe as all other mechwarrior games, whos to say that they game would not have been balanced as it is now(back then) if the technology was available to handle it.

In other words, quite the game, or stop complaining and get used to how it is now, and pick fights that matter. Like 3rd person view.

[0I0]

Tank Boy Ken, on 10 April 2013 - 10:32 AM, said:

MWO needs to get even more distance to the TT rules to become the game it's destined to be. It's a very good game even in it's current iteration.

Couldn't have said it better myself(I tried in allot of extra words).

[Karl Streiger]

Oloccorb, on 15 April 2013 - 09:38 AM, said:

As a last note, I've taken it on as a personal crusade to go after any post that attacks this game merely because its not like games that it is not. I.E although in the same universe as all other mechwarrior games, whos to say that they game would not have been balanced as it is now(back then) if the technology was available to handle it.

So your crusade reason you to open threaded wounds?

But hey...why not on the next 400 POSTS - just to keep it running.

Doubling Armor Value...with keeping the normal Damage means: A light mech can take a Hit of a AC 20 - or a PPC without critical damage. So doubling armor value destroys the first balance. THe bigger the gun the lesser hits do you need. You don't have to deal 96 dmg towards a Panther - a single Strike with the AC 20 could be enough. That means some mechs like the Hunchback had a armor distribution to take multiple hits by the AC 20 ...while they can fire back.
Hower doubling armor value allone isn't the problem alone. They just doubled the armor values that didn't changed since the founding of TT. It isn't the fault of PGI alone. Its the fault of BattleTech RuleBooks since the 1st Edition too.
But while only the average damage a BattleMech can spit out was increased in TT...the accuracy and no convergence issue of MWO also causes more problems.
I know that most of you are able to target a Atlas Side Torso or CT torso with ease - ignoring the completely the arms and legs. So even when the pilot is turning its torso left - right - left to spread incoming damage the Atlas is hardly able to take the damage a TT Atlas can take.

To go back to the example of the Hunchback....I said several hits...with even spread a Hunchback would be able to take 1 - 5 hits without serious damage(there are 5 zones that can take 20dmg). In MWO ...every pilot that is worth his money will blow of the Torso of the Hunchback in 3 shots.
Well that look ok when just considering AC 20s. But what about Medium Lasers. Same Hunchback can eat 4-26 shots with medium lasers. Same pilot as before will take out a Hunchback with 12 shots.

So that is just the meaning of point 1: Doubling Armor. Your Crusade is missguided if you are not able to see the connection.

[Pht]

Syllogy, on 12 April 2013 - 06:17 PM, said:

And we're to the basis of the world's monetary system, and the Court of Justice.

What makes $1 worth $1? The fact that the majority agrees.

What makes a man guilty of a crime? The fact that the majority agrees.

Tell us, do you believe in a reality that actually exists outside of your mind?

Or are we all figments of your imagination, to be manipulated at your will?

Quote

And philosophically, yes. Truth is determined by consensus. Fact is quantified with inarguable data. They are not mutually exclusive.

Oh, how ironic, to appeal to logic (mutual exclusivity) and than be utterly irrational in one's definitions.

The only way you can assert that truth is determined by consensus is to define truth as being completely variable at all times and never set.

Um, furthermore, if everyone decided that truth WASN'T decided and set by majority consensus, would truth than be not determined by majority consensus?

If you say no, than you're smuggling in the idea of absolute, objective, unchaging truth - you're saying that it's absolutely, objectively, unchangingly true that truth is relative and determined by majority counts.

[Pht]

blinkin, on 13 April 2013 - 12:36 AM, said:

... but if you can convince me of the validity of each individual peice i will accept those peices, but i will judge each rule or system on it's own merits. none of it gets to slip by just because it works with dice and measuring sticks in a turn based game.

Which is fine... and is one of the reasons I asked you which parts you thought would not work.

I've been in the buisness of trying to demonstrate how the combat system would work in realtime w/o the human skill simulating parts of that combat system.

Quote

it is a very drastic change when you take the turns and dice out of a tabletop game, so everything must be thoroughly tested and justified. ... simply trusting outright that everything would be portable is plain ignorance.

Than let's get on with it: discussing the porting over of the combat system from the TT, what would be good, and what wouldn't.

I've already done so, and the thread is linked in my signature.

I think you'll find that I've got good reasons for wanting to port it over in the way I've been trying to discuss doing it. If I didn't think so, i wouldn't be here on page 21.

[Pht]

Pinselborste, on 13 April 2013 - 06:28 AM, said:

The TT stats where made to work with the mechanics of a turnbased game where you have random hit locations...

The hit locations aren't random, not if you mean by the word random what most people here mean.

The hit percentages are based off of whatever situations are occuring when your mech tries to make the shot you're asking of it and how well your mech can ultimately get its weapons to align on the target you're tracking.

Quote

and people dont move at the same time they shoot,

In the normal game, no, however, there is the opportunity fire: firing on the move stuff, so this argument is pretty much moot.

Quote

they work well for that but they where never made to work in a realtime game where you aim yourself.

You aim in the TT too. Most people simply do not use this stuff in the TT though, because the game is fairly slow.

The called shot tables represent the MW's aiming skill vs mobile targets.

[Pht]

MustrumRidcully, on 13 April 2013 - 09:33 AM, said:

2) Take the canon stats as base, including the heat scale, and then adjust where you need to account for non-random hit location

Ah, and this is the crux of the problem.

Everyone acts as if the 'Mech doesn't matter as far as what locations get hit on the target - which is patently impossible in the lore (even forgetting the tabletop completely, it's still impossible)... the 'mech's capabilites always matter.

Gunnery skill in a fictional BT mech is mostly about knowing how well the 'Mech can hit what you're tracking with the reticule on your hud. No MW games have modeled this, which is a shame.


The mech's capabilities with the weapons making a big difference is one of the core components of the BT lore/stories/etc... and not just in some places, but everywhere.

it's intrinsic.

That's why a good MW game should at least make an honest attempt to model the combat capabilites of the 'Mech and how well the 'mechs can handle whatever situation is occuring when you pull the triggers to try and hit the target you're tracking with the reticule on the hud.

Edited by Pht, 16 April 2013 - 01:58 PM.

[ZonbiBadger]

Things aren't going back to canon because they didn't work. This post is a waste of time for all involved. I think tabletop is what you are looking for OP.

[Pht]

ZonbiBadger, on 16 April 2013 - 02:09 PM, said:

Things aren't going back to canon because they didn't work.

In order for them to have not work they would have to have been tried. They never were. The to-hit mechanic and the hit-location mechanics that give the math on how well the mech performs and how well it can handle whatever and make the shot being asked of it ... the two mechanics that the weapons damage stats and armor value stats were DESIGNED to work with ... were not used... not in any way.

Quote

This post is a waste of time for all involved. I think tabletop is what you are looking for OP.

I think quake 3 is what you're looking for.


...

Hey, if it's ok for you to do this... it's ok for everyone else, right?

[Theodor Kling]

1. Doubling Armor

Effect: Weight class balance is destroyed. Light mechs can easily get in a brawl with mechs 5 times their size and beat them with their lag shields. And combined with...
Lag shield is mostly gone, and the doubling of armour is questionable, sure, but not realy that much ofan issue. makes fights longer.
2. Tripling weapon RoF

Effect: Weapon balance is destroyed. Gauss is the only ballistic worth using, all canon designs are way overheated, Energy boats are forced to boat heat sinks.
Problematic at first, but mostly working ( and apart from the Solaris VII rules the TT is not big on rof anyway). Additionaly: Energy boats need to boat HS? Sreiously.. not that MUST be wrong
3. No guidance on SRMs.

Effect: By treating SRMs like Rocket Launchers, They are useless at anything other than point blank. I mean that literally, I can count on one hand the number of times an SRM boat killed me. Every time was at point blank. They literally have no range.
I misliked it at first, but I can actually live with the distinction SRM0unguided, SSRM= guided. Yeah it is wrong, but it works. And you can hit with SRMs. Heavies and assaults with ease, but also lighter ones with some timing and good aim. Although for max range artemis is near mandatory.
4. Treating ECM like Stealth Armor, AECM, and a regular ECM all at the same time.

Effect: I think you know just how badly this is screwing up the game. ECM doesn't stop missile locks in canon, or reduce detection range.
Yeah, the different EW systems shoudl be seperated. It doesn ot realy screw up the game for me, but more diversity and lore friendliness would be good nevertheless.
5. Treating BAP as... a targeting system?

Effect: BAP is supposed to act as a better sensor system. That it does do. But it is also supposed to be a Counter-ECM. Any ECM field it's near is nullified. In here, it... isn't. That's why nobody uses BAP.
I actually did on my LRM cat. The faster lockon ( which does make sense) makes it usefull. I agree about the ECM negating part though.
6. Streak SRMs always hit.

Effect: SSRMs are only supposed to be perfectly accurate IF you actually get a hit. That is, it's just as accurate as any other weapon, except more missiles hit, and if you miss, the weapon doesn't fire. Instead, we get a weapon that almost never misses, and does tons of damage for low heat and weight. Also it goes great on ECM mechs.
Although no canon , it works well together with the unguided SRMs. It sure coems in handy agaisnt Jenners. But I actually stopped usign them on my lights, because I can fit a lot more firepower into themusing regular SRMs, resultign in comparable dg to lights ( less hits, but more bang), and a considerable increase against the big guys.
7. Unjammable U/AC-5s

Effect: U/AC-5's still suck.
They do jam. They unjam as well. And about sucking: I ostly go with ligths so I rareley field them, but I have seen others do so agaisnt me or when spectating. With decent aim they are real nasty.

8. Machineguns not doing 2 damage.

Effect: MGs are useless.
MGs were always useless against mechs that still had armour. That is fine. They are not meant to be used in Mech to Mech cobmat, but against infantry and light hovers.
9. Less than Double Double Heat Sinks.

Effect: EVERYTHING past intro tech was designed with DHS in mind. ERPPCs, ERLLs, MRMs, ect.... Effectively reducing heat sinking across the board just ***** them even more than already. Heat was ALREADY A PROBLEM TO BEGIN WITH.
I want to agree with you for canons sake.. but the system actually works atm, so let it be.
10. No heat scale effects.

Effect: With only "shutdown" and "perfectly fine", there's absolutely no reason not to alpha strike. In TT you would slow down, become less accurate, and maybe blow up with too much heat. NOPE! Not here!

YES! I totall agree with you here. Heat penalties must come.

[MustrumRidcully]

Pht, on 16 April 2013 - 01:56 PM, said:

it's intrinsic.

That's why a good MW game should at least make an honest attempt to model the combat capabilites of the 'Mech and how well the 'mechs can handle whatever situation is occuring when you pull the triggers to try and hit the target you're tracking with the reticule on the hud.

Actually, I think battletech is ripe for a new edition with new rules that by default assumes convergence and player-selected hit locations by default. That isn't necessarily easy to do - trying to translate all the "old" mechs to the new format would be difficult, for example. You either make it a complete retcon, or you advance the timeline one or two centuries.

I don't think that random hit locations will ever fly in an FPS like game. It will work in a strategy game (be it turn based or real time), but when you give the player a mouse or a joystick and seat him inside the cockpit, he will want to be in control of aiming.

What maybe a Mechwarrior title could manage is to enforce chain-firing weapons.

Edited by MustrumRidcully, 17 April 2013 - 02:13 AM.

[Kmieciu]

Theodor Kling, on 17 April 2013 - 01:13 AM, said:

That's why nobody uses BAP.
I actually did on my LRM cat. The faster lockon ( which does make sense) makes it usefull.

BAP does not affect lockon time.
Artemis does.

Theodor Kling, on 17 April 2013 - 01:13 AM, said:

MGs were always useless against mechs that still had armour. That is fine. They are not meant to be used in Mech to Mech cobmat, but against infantry and light hovers.

always where?
Table top? Very deadly up close. Yo could swap AC20 for 28 machineguns and deal up to 56 points of damage point blank per turn. 1 Tonne of ammo would last 7 turns ( 70 seconds in MWO).
Mechwarrior 2? Useful.
Mechwarrior 3? Borderline overpowered.
Mechwarrior 4? Quite Useful.

[Karl Streiger]

Theodor Kling, on 17 April 2013 - 01:13 AM, said:

Lag shield is mostly gone, and the doubling of armour is questionable, sure, but not realy that much ofan issue. makes fights longer.

Stop thinking that doubling armor means that fights in MWO last longer.
Show me a single Atlas or a Catapract that can eat 20Shots from a AC 20, 29 shots of a PPC or 61 shots of a Medium Laser.
The mouse aim alone, is enough to make any armor doubling or trippling or quadruppeling complete nonsense.
It just makes BattleMechs harder target for newbies and still fodder for elite gamers.

Edited by Karl Streiger, 17 April 2013 - 05:38 AM.