60 replies to this topic

[Ragor]

MWLL did lots of stuff wrong. But then again they got a lot of stuff right as well.

Spoiler

What is MWLL?

MWLL had some quite nice gamemechanics.

What could MWO have 'learned' from MWLL?


The jumpsniping annoyance.

MWLL was really concerned about extensive use of jumpsniping. Like it once was performed in MW4 and really split the community those days.

The MWLL solution:
A shake effect (affecting camera AND crosshair, sperate from each other) while using jumpjets.
-> Jumpsniping wasn't impossible but took by far more practise and was easier to counter, because the jumping sniper had to jump higher to get more time with the smooth 'float down' phase to line up the shots.


The mech heat issue.
In MWLL players had the known bad habit of constantly running very hot and/or not caring about shutting down or simply overriding the shutdown with pure energy builds.

The MWLL solution:
part #1: Above 100% heat the armor of the mech took constant damage. Not much, but enough to not do it too often. Logic wise it made no sense at all, but it was a working and accepted mechanic.

part #2: When running above 90% heat for a too long time, the heatsinks took damage. -> Their heat effciency got decreased.
The hotter your mech was running the faster the heat effciency dropped - and the damage was permanent.
-> You entered the match with for example 16DHS. After running around at ~100% heat for some time you still had your 16DHS, but they now worked only with 75% of their original effciency. As if only 12 where mounted. Bad luck for the trigger happy laser junkie.

my personaly favored part #3: (aka 'what I always wanted in')
Heat above 120%? -> mechpilot passes out until heat is again below 80%.
(Would even be a nice pilot perk to recover earlier and/or to tolerate higher heat levels)


The LBX disease.
The MWLL LBX family had the same bad reputation of being a heavy piece of useless junk, only usable in closest encounters.

The MWLL solution:
part #1: The spread got decreased to sane levels. At ~200m the whole load of an LBX-20 (which still had the widest spread!) struck the upper torso of a heavy mech.
part #2: An damage increase for internals.
As soon as the armor was down to 25%, 25% of the LBX damage hit already the structure. No armor left, the LBX did 25% more damage.


The UAC fault.
In MWLL Ultra Autocannons got their own weapon heat bar.
For example an UAC10 could fire 5 shots in rapid succession. But then the 'heat bar' was full. The sixth shot would jam the weapon at once. Or the pilot could decide to fire with approximately the ROF of a regular AC10 and had no worries.
The cooldown speed was at ~80% of the increase in 'weapon heat'.
-> Random chances are always BS, player control ftw.
Sidenote:
Regular AC had less spread than the UAC.


Why invent the wheel a second time when you can learn from the experience of others?


EDIT #1:
What about the passive/active sensor system of MWLL?

EDIT #2:

Spoiler

How did the MWLL sensor system work?
The sensors could be switched from active to passive mode.
On active mode it is quite like the MWO radar system except that it wasn't line of sight dependent.
On passive mode the sensor range got decreased to 250m and became line of sight dependent.
While running passive, any enemy mech on passive as coulnd't be detected at all. Only 'active' enemies showed up.
Passive running mechs could be locked on as well by LRMs, but the lock on time got trippled.
BAP and BHP still increased the detection range by 25%(BAP) / 50%(BHP).
(Me personally always wanted BAP&BHP equipped mechs on passive not depended on line of sight for detection.)
While running passive LRM and SSRM couldn't lock on enemies. -> LRM boats had to use active sensors to be able to fire their missiles.


And what about the MWLL TAG & Narc system?
Both systems decreased the lock on time for LRM and SSRM by far.
And LRMs (not SSRM!) flying around without a lock automatically locked on the next friendly TAG or Narc beacon.
-> LRM could be blindfired past the enemy position, a scout then uses his TAG or Narc and the missiles then locked onto that signal and could be guided into the target.
-> It was possible to blindfire LRMs and then guiding them around obstacles using the TAG and finally lead them into the target.

Easier explanation:
LRMs behaved like a kitten trying to catch a laser dot on the floor.

Spoiler

(Sounds very overpowered on the first read, but it actually wasn't since it required lots of skill and teamwork to work effectively and LRM had a quite wide turning radius.)

Edited by Ragor, 25 April 2013 - 08:27 AM.

[Troutmonkey]

These are all good ideas. I fully support them.

I still don't know what MWLL is though..

[Zerstorer Stallin]

MechWarrior Living Legends, guys with way small budget ( mostly free ) who made a game that did a lot right. PGI could take some notes.

[Ragor]

Zerstorer Stallin, on 24 April 2013 - 10:25 PM, said:

Troutmonkey, on 24 April 2013 - 10:11 PM, said:

These are all good ideas. I fully support them.

I still don't know what MWLL is though..

MechWarrior Living Legends, guys with way small budget ( mostly free ) who made a game that did a lot right. PGI could take some notes.

Not the full truth. Wandering Samurai (the team which did MWLL) was a mod team with no budget at all. They made a total conversion based on the Cryengine 1 (later switched to CE2) to create Mechwarrior: Living Legends.
It was this teams effort which made mechs possible in the Cryengine, since Crytek themselves stated, that mechs are not possible with the CE code. The two founders of MWLL proofed them wrong in 2008. And got hired by Crytek in 2009...
In early 2010 they left the MWLL project, but the grown team of MWLL continued development.

Now the official story:
Mid 2012 the originals founders decided to shut down the project (although they had left it in 2010 and turned over everything to the new project lead) after the team officially announced a free reticule aiming system which was in development since July 2010. They had a deadline to stop development until the end of 2012. (This deadlined got once stretched as an act of generosity to the 24th of january 2013 to release one fixing patch.)
To bring the story to an end:
In no way the MWLL team got legally threatened by anyone. They simply all decided to stop development on the 80% finished product they spent their last 40 months of freetime on. None of the devs wants to continue the mod project and everybody decided their hobby runs out of being fun with the end of 2012.

That's life.

[Varnas]

Yup.

[Inertiamon]

Also of course the MWLL guys weren't working in the Canadian games version of the Bermuda Triangle where maps inexplicably cost quarter of a million dollars each to make and mechs cost more to make virtually than a new ferrari costs in real life.

[Ragor]

-deleted because offtopic-

Edited by Ragor, 25 April 2013 - 04:56 AM.

[PappySmurf]

Nothing they don't even listen to there fans and players and just want to All PGI wants is (DA MONEY)and they don't want any feedback from the new or old communities there web rating is like -50 on liking the game or the direction it is going that's why they have split the forums up so much there afraid of there player base and all the positive or negative feedback. I personally think PGI is just milking out the MechWarrior community till they quit paying then they will dump the servers and the players and fans. Im sorry but the game just plain sucks its to repetitive and boring and there is no chat lobby's or private matches so best advise just move on to a funner game.

[Ragor]

PappySmurf, on 25 April 2013 - 06:00 AM, said:

Nothing they don't even listen to there fans and players and just want to All PGI wants is (DA MONEY)and they don't want any feedback from the new or old communities there web rating is like -50 on liking the game or the direction it is going that's why they have split the forums up so much there afraid of there player base and all the positive or negative feedback. I personally think PGI is just milking out the MechWarrior community till they quit paying then they will dump the servers and the players and fans. Im sorry but the game just plain sucks its to repetitive and boring and there is no chat lobby's or private matches so best advise just move on to a funner game.

I feel free to disagree. It is all work in progress and lots of missing features you mentioned is already in the works. MWO is not a finished product at all. We have to be patient and have trust in PGI. But the lastest changes in the gameflow makes it hard for me to keep my faith up.

But I totally agree on your point, that the creative team of PGI is not really listening to feedback. They are aware of the feedback and discuss it internally, but at the end of the day they stick with their own concepts.
The problem is, that in the end somebody has to decide what to do.
And in my experience the key persons which have the position to be able to decide stuff, lost their competence to be able to judge these things on their way to get into that position. They might be brilliant in setting up concepts. But they see concepts as the final product. The needed tuning and maybe adjustment of their concept they often see as personal attack.

IMO a good gamedesigners listens to the QA of the actual project. And not to the other gamedesigners around him.
The QA knows the game the best. But usually their opinion gets noted somewhere but not considered.
Yes, Mr CreativeMan, I know, you do listen. And you actually do play the game yourself. And you are not biased towards yourself. But: Are you sure? Do you still spent as much time in games like you did 10 years ago? Or do you more rely on your experiences of the past?


Edit:
I wonder, why this thread is mostly all about what is wrong and why and blah.
I wonder, why there is no discussion and enhancements about the OP.

Edited by Ragor, 25 April 2013 - 06:39 AM.

[Vrekgar]

All of these suggestions sound good to me.

[Nightfangs]

I can't find a reason why ALL of those ideas aren't implimented yet in one form or the other.
Simple and effective... *sigh*

[LordBraxton]

+10 for heat suggestions

[Phalanx100bc]

Never understood why PGI never reached out to any of those guys....seems like a good talent pool to draw from. I'm sure most of those guys have real jobs now and much less free time on thier hands.

[General Taskeen]

Zerstorer Stallin, on 24 April 2013 - 10:25 PM, said:

MechWarrior Living Legends, guys with way small budget ( mostly free ) who made a game that did a lot right. PGI could take some notes.

This is MW:LL, and a video I made playing as the Clan Mech "Cougar," when playing an older version of the mod



There are plenty of features of MW:LL that "did" right concerning equipment or how some of the weapons work. MWO has a graphical edge in terms of Mech Design/Artwork, but the balance is still way off.

- Great Sounds (especially AC's)
- Autocannons are fast fire, and all can jam if fired for too long (it is based on skill, the gun itself can "overheat" and if the overheat bar on the gun reaches maximum, it will jam)
- UAC's (as of the last version 0.7.1 are twice as fast firing, and Burst Fire, each individual bullet of the burst does damage, landing all shots in same location does massive damage)

• UAC/2 expends 10 Ammo Per Shot
  
• UAC/5 expends 7 Ammo Per Shot
  
• UAC/10 expends 5 Ammo Per Shot
  
• UAC/20 Expends 3 Ammo Per Shot

- LB-X guns are long range, slower firing, but have huge burst damage

- NARC allows missiles to auto-seek the beacon if dumb-fired (like it is supposed to from TT)
- Heat/over ride is better balanced, slowly damages mech if staying in over ride zone, damages heat sinks, then damages weapons, then destroys your mech if continuing to stay in the red zone
- Active/Passive Radar, C3 Master/Slave Units, Balanced ECM (missiles can lock onto ECM, just takes longer, Passive + ECM allows sneaking around, no radar can find you, but people can lock-target you if they see you)
- Huge maps combined with the popular "Terrain Control" respawn mode (a "classic" conquest mode combined with Battle Tech Operational Warfare)
- All Mechs are based on the build rules (no mech lab though), although weapon damage/heat is different, they made sure to capture the "feel" and expected damage/range for weapons


Some things MWO copied from MW:LL already, such as a limited copy of the MW:LL regular pulse lasers. They also copied the "stream MG and Flamer" which is why they are bad in MWO. The MG/Flamer is good vs. infantry and vehicles in MW:LL, because there is "paper-rock-scissors" balance in that game when weapons are fired at certain vehicles. However, MWO is only and will only be Mech vs. Mech, so therefore those types of weapons must be made useful for this game.

Edited by General Taskeen, 25 April 2013 - 06:49 AM.

[MaddMaxx]

Inertiamon, on 25 April 2013 - 04:18 AM, said:

Also of course the MWLL guys weren't working in the Canadian games version of the Bermuda Triangle where maps inexplicably cost quarter of a million dollars each to make and mechs cost more to make virtually than a new ferrari costs in real life.

Are you going to make a point?

[Ragor]

General Taskeen, on 25 April 2013 - 06:46 AM, said:

(...)

In the pipeline of MWLL development (but never released):
Alternative versions of each (U)AC:
Example (U)AC/20
The players should be able to choose from the regular large bore (U)AC/20, firing one single shell. (like known from the TT rules)
Or they could go with a small caliber variant, firing whole clips but doing overall the same amount of damage. Aka burstfire. (like known from the novels)
Ask Alex 'FD' about, he was totally for it as well and worked on the concepts to some degree.


The internal damage model (never released) was off the TT rules, but made more sense regarding the lore.
It included:
- activator damage
- gyro damage
- weapon damage (from longer recycle time to loss of accuracy)
- damage of sensors
- damage of powerlines
- damage of ammo feeding lines
- myomer damage

Stuff which should change:
- MASC should be changed at some point from 'enable per key' to 'enabled via mechheat'. (MASC would be active as soon a mech reaches 60% heat)

And one of my most loved features (it was part of the CE1 code but got disabled in the corecode by Crytek in CE2 (but still is in the code):
Leaning of mechs when accelerating/deccelerating and leaning into curves.

Spoiler

Start the video at ~1:20 to directly see the leaning mechanincs in action.

http://www.youtube.c...d&v=0lbN_Yf8wp8

This feature should be reimplemented by Wandering Samurais own code at some point.
And yes, it really made piloting fast mechs a rush. Was really fun.

A feature which was internally tested but never got released to no time to polish it properly:
Alternative ammunition types. The huge drawback of UAC since they only can use standard ammo. (...and are a tad less accurate than regular AC)

Edited by Ragor, 25 April 2013 - 07:37 AM.

[Inertiamon]

MaddMaxx, on 25 April 2013 - 06:59 AM, said:

Are you going to make a point?

If you wish. I'm still in total disbelief about the claimed cost of creating MWO maps. Either it's lies or they're getting turned over. Either is bad.

[Ragor]

Inertiamon, on 25 April 2013 - 07:16 AM, said:

If you wish. I'm still in total disbelief about the claimed cost of creating MWO maps. Either it's lies or they're getting turned over. Either is bad.

The 'claimed costs' are unfortunately valid.
Creating a map takes hundreds of manhours.
For the mappers, the 2D artists (textures), the 3D artists (assets) and the QA.
Which must be payed. Plus their workspace and so on.
A volunteer project doesn't have these costs.
And the working hours do not count.

[Inertiamon]

Sorry it just doesn't work. Even if the business is generating a huge string of overheads and those are accurately attributed pro rata to the map development costs (which in itself requires more BI than I've seen evidence of) then you're looking at creatives taking home half a million dollars or more a year to get to these estimates.

[Inertiamon]

But alright - say it's all apportioned correctly and it's costing quarter of a mill to pump out the likes of Alpine.

It frigging shouldn't..