66 replies to this topic

[Matthew Ace]

Lyoto Machida, on 31 May 2013 - 11:20 PM, said:

Heat penalties kinda go against the idea of dumbing down the game for mass consumption, no? I mean, how are we gonna get all these 12 year old kids to play?

Gee, I dunno, I played MW2 and MW3 as a kid (MW2 when I was 8 or 9, I'm now 24) and understood heat management. Why don't you tell me?

[Galenit]

Heat capacity increase for heatsinks is stupid, they can only increase the heat dissipation. Your gpu will melt at some high degree, putting gpu-cooler+fan on it dont increase the this point, but they help to stay under this point.

Why no linear increase of the penaltys?

For every 1% over 80% heat you get 2% speed decrease as example. Same for torsotwist, convergence (if it would be noticable), armmovement, turning, ....

Why is the ammo explosion not linear too? You get 1% of ammo explosion chance at 100% heat, every 1% over this increases the chance by 1%, at 120% heat you have a chance of 21% for a ammo explosion every second you stay on this level.

Same for heatsinkmelting, every second over some threshold gives you a chance to melt a heatsink.
At 100% heat there is 0% chance to melt, for every 1% over that you get a chance of 1%.
Theoretical you will lose a heatsink for every 5 seconds you stay at 120% heat, with bad luck you will lose 5 heatsinks in this time ...

But some effects just should be hardcapped, like hud flickering.

Edited by Galenit, 01 June 2013 - 02:24 AM.

[Demuder]

A lot of work from the op and congratulations for it, however, keep in mind that balancing needs one thing above all. Baby steps. We don't need to turn the game on it's head. Tweak something, wait for 2 weeks, check results, tweak something else. It's a rather complex system taking in account all the possible chassis/variants and weapon loadouts, any more than two changes at a time will wreak havoc - remember the LRM patch two weeks ago ?

[Pater Mors]

Galenit, on 01 June 2013 - 02:24 AM, said:

Heat capacity increase for heatsinks is stupid, they can only increase the heat dissipation. Your gpu will melt at some high degree, putting gpu-cooler+fan on it dont increase the this point, but they help to stay under this point.

Why no linear increase of the penaltys?

For every 1% over 80% heat you get 2% speed decrease as example. Same for torsotwist, convergence (if it would be noticable), armmovement, turning, ....

Why is the ammo explosion not linear too? You get 1% of ammo explosion chance at 100% heat, every 1% over this increases the chance by 1%, at 120% heat you have a chance of 21% for a ammo explosion every second you stay on this level.

Same for heatsinkmelting, every second over some threshold gives you a chance to melt a heatsink.
At 100% heat there is 0% chance to melt, for every 1% over that you get a chance of 1%.
Theoretical you will lose a heatsink for every 5 seconds you stay at 120% heat, with bad luck you will lose 5 heatsinks in this time ...

But some effects just should be hardcapped, like hud flickering.

Those are some good suggestions and I wouldn't be opposed to them. As I said in the OP all the numbers I came up with are just placeholders. There's no necessary need for them to be linear.

dimstog, on 01 June 2013 - 02:57 AM, said:

A lot of work from the op and congratulations for it, however, keep in mind that balancing needs one thing above all. Baby steps. We don't need to turn the game on it's head. Tweak something, wait for 2 weeks, check results, tweak something else. It's a rather complex system taking in account all the possible chassis/variants and weapon loadouts, any more than two changes at a time will wreak havoc - remember the LRM patch two weeks ago ?

Yep. I agree. I don't think all of this should be lumped into the game in one big heap. Testing things one step at a time would be the better option.

Also, I note that this has been moved into the Feature Suggestions board. Cheers for that moderators, if you think this is where it should be.

Edited by Pater Mors, 01 June 2013 - 04:06 AM.

[Snowseth]

zazz0000, on 31 May 2013 - 06:28 PM, said:

Wait wasn't this already a thread like 3 hours ago? with replies? and views? and.... stuff?

Hell, I've posted something similar last month. And I have seen other similar posts since then too.

I think the principle is that the MWO community actually wants heat to more than a nuisance. We want soft/temporary penalty and hard/permanent penalties for running too hot, for too long, and so on.

I know I think heat should be the Great Balance. And is a much better option than attempting to force hard weapon limits, that arises from 4-6 PPC boats. Throw heat as a threat, and suddenly a 4-ppc anything becomes much less viable.

[MustrumRidcully]

Matthew Ace, on 31 May 2013 - 11:29 PM, said:

Gee, I dunno, I played MW2 and MW3 as a kid (MW2 when I was 8 or 9, I'm now 24) and understood heat management. Why don't you tell me?

Just think about at what age people started to play the original Battletech...

The key thing is probably not whether something is complex or complicated, but because the mechanic enables fun gameplay.

[Matthew Ace]

MustrumRidcully, on 01 June 2013 - 08:02 AM, said:

Just think about at what age people started to play the original Battletech... The key thing is probably not whether something is complex or complicated, but because the mechanic enables fun gameplay.

(Nods in agreement)

Funny thing was, I didn't get into Tabletop until I was around 14. Hehe.

[blinkin]

MustrumRidcully, on 01 June 2013 - 08:02 AM, said:

Just think about at what age people started to play the original Battletech...

The key thing is probably not whether something is complex or complicated, but because the mechanic enables fun gameplay.

i hate this general view that games, movies, or any form of entertainment need to be thoroughly dumbed down for younger people to enjoy them.

[Hotthedd]

Marj, on 31 May 2013 - 09:04 PM, said:

I don't think there's any way to encourage chain firing.


The only thing chain firing does is remove piloting as a skill because you can't take your reticle off your target so you're forced to circle all the time.

Getting rid of instant pinpoint convergence, coupled with Alpha strike heat penalties should do the trick.

It actually takes MORE skill with chain fire. You CAN take your reticle off the enemy in order to torso twist (You just need the skill to aim more than once)

[Barghest Whelp]

Yeah, I've been shouting about this for quite some time.

Screen blurring, HUD getting scrambled, crackling sounds on the radio, the female vioce thingy giving bogus messages, speed penalties, weapons cycling slower... there are so many options. Heat shouldn't just be a reload mechanic, but more like a mechwarrior's worst nightmare.

The only thing I don't agree with is the "after being above 80% for an extended amount of time" bit. I think it should be more like "the more heat you have, the more penalties you get". And they should stack as well. Go above the threshold for a certainpenlty enough times and you now have that penalty permanently.

I like the idea of having sweat drips though. Haven't heard that one before, but it's a good idea. Either way, I think the more the merrier. I really loved how heat messed up your HUD in MW3. With todays modern technology I can only begin to imagine what kind of things could be made possible.

[ArmageddonKnight]

OP.

Most people on these forums agree with heat penalties and a change in the heat system (lower cap higher cooling rate). There have been a handful lof thread like this with polls.

Problem is PGI dont seem to be wanting to do it. otherwise they would have done it long ago. Instead they persist on 'balancing' individual weapons on the bassis of boating. Which in turns screw up each weapon when used in more reasonable numbers (1 - 3 usualy)

Another thing u will note is that people who dont llke this idea will generaly be those who are abusing the current flaws in the heat system and are using high heat high alpha boats.

[Pater Mors]

ArmageddonKnight, on 01 June 2013 - 11:10 AM, said:

OP.

Most people on these forums agree with heat penalties and a change in the heat system (lower cap higher cooling rate). There have been a handful lof thread like this with polls.

Problem is PGI dont seem to be wanting to do it. otherwise they would have done it long ago. Instead they persist on 'balancing' individual weapons on the bassis of boating. Which in turns screw up each weapon when used in more reasonable numbers (1 - 3 usualy)

Another thing u will note is that people who dont llke this idea will generaly be those who are abusing the current flaws in the heat system and are using high heat high alpha boats.

Well there's only one thing we can do there mate and that's to keep posting about it, keep the discussions going in all the different threads and keep the polls going.

I have faith that PGI will come around. They've got a big list of things to do and have maybe bitten off a big mouthful with this game. We'll just have to wait another year or two and see whether it was more than they can chew or not.

Barghest Whelp, on 01 June 2013 - 11:10 AM, said:

The only thing I don't agree with is the "after being above 80% for an extended amount of time" bit. I think it should be more like "the more heat you have, the more penalties you get". And they should stack as well. Go above the threshold for a certainpenlty enough times and you now have that penalty permanently.

Let me expand on my reasoning behind that for a minute:

Your Mech is designed to handle a certain amount of heat (100% of it's capacity). I don't like the idea of getting penalties before that 100% unless you're operating very close to that threshold for an extended period. In the same way that your laptop can run hot for a very long time but you will notice performance issues the longer you let it run hot, specifically processing speed, lockups, display bugs etc etc. Eventually it will break the threshold and turn off.

Those 'per second' numbers aren't set in stone. It could easily be a shorter time frame above 80% (or any other arbitrary number close to 100%). I also agree that the penalties that I outlined in the OP should stack.

I am just not a fan of applying penalties too early in the heat scale because I think that the Mech's would be designed to handle that amount of heat for short periods.

Edited by Pater Mors, 01 June 2013 - 01:16 PM.

[Bhael Fire]

Sounds like some good ideas.

I really like the idea of sweat beads on screen and malfunctioning HUD with ghost targets on the radar. I'm all for anything that adds to the immersion.

[ExtremeA79]

Bhael Fire, on 01 June 2013 - 06:33 PM, said:

Sounds like some good ideas.

I really like the idea of sweat beads on screen and malfunctioning HUD with ghost targets on the radar. I'm all for anything that adds to the immersion.

Awesome, I would like that too.

[Theodor Kling]

Lyoto Machida, on 31 May 2013 - 11:20 PM, said:

Heat penalties kinda go against the idea of dumbing down the game for mass consumption, no? I mean, how are we gonna get all these 12 year old kids to play?

I voted yes, because I like my games complicated..but I fear your prophecy is true

[MadcatX]

Something at the very least that could be implemented is having progressively longer shutdown times based on how many times you've already shut down.

But having hud malfunction (and when really hot, have the reticule malfuction and throw the aim off a bit for a split-second here and there. Actually throw off the aim instead of just making it more difficult to do so).

Make Alpha-Striking a tactical choice and not the norm. If I had to take a split-second to decide if I should fire everything in hopes of a kill (or destroying a vital area) but then have the consequences of having my movement and aim reduced drastically or to continue chain-firing, at that point I would consider this game "a thinking man's shooter".

[Belorion]

Agreeing with heat penalties and agreeing with the op suggestion are two totally different things. First off even though they aren't all that fleshed out right now there are already heat penalties in the game. Second the op suggestion is more about limiting alpha strikes than having anything to do with heat penalties. Alpha strikes are fine. They are part of the game, always have been, and should always be.

[The Gunman]

OP,

If I've read your post correctly, under your proposal a player could:
Alpha 6 ERPPCs,
spike their heat level to 170% or beyond,
then automatically shut down,
automatically power up,
then continue on their way with no lasting after effects. Correct?

While another player could:
Chain fire AC2's,
Override auto shut down,
heat up to 101%
Suffer permanent damage to mechs systems.


If so, how would your suggestion discourage Alphas?

[Syllogy]

Heat penalties are a staple of Battletech, not Mechwarrior.

[HiplyRustic]

Kitane, on 31 May 2013 - 09:33 PM, said:

A lowered heat cap and increased heat dissipation is something a lot of people will agree with.

Heat penalties could be more harsh and start at lower heat level.

1) A mech speed, agility and torso twisting is affected by engine power. Make engine power drop gradually and immediately as the heat increases, for example: -10% at 50% heat, -20% at 70% heat, -30% at 80% heat, -50% at 90% heat.

2) Ammo explosion chance should increase with the current heat level. Right now it is 10% when a stack of ammo is destroyed. Make it scale with the heat, with a guaranteed ammo explosion when destroyed by enemy fire at 100%+ heat level.
This would make flamers in combination with other notorious crit seeking weapons an interesting weapon choice against ammo using mechs.

3) The number of heatsinks should be permanently lowered by 1 for every second you spend above 100% during override, 2 at 115%, 3 at 130%...
Overriding a shutdown should be a desperate measure with drawbacks. Overriding twice in a match should leave your mech in a bad shape regardless of how many damage you suffered from the enemy.
Non overriden shutdown should also take out heatsinks, but at lower speed. The initial tick would be same as above, and another loss would occur every 3s instead of every second.

The reason is that people need to learn that overheating is bad, and a shutdown override must be crippling, reserved only for the most desperate moments.

You can't be serious? Start crippling mechs @50% of their rated design capacity for heat management? Do you realize how many non-boats you'll cripple that way? What is your goal?

Mechs are rated to deal with a specified amount of heat safely, and until that threshold is crossed there should be no penalties, it's asinine.

Edited by HiplyRustic, 04 June 2013 - 05:32 AM.