15 replies to this topic

[Phoenix Branson]

Maintenance Fees by Weight Class

Medium
Very Easy to Maintain (most economically viable 'Mechs)
Maintenance Fees: -1,500 cbills / match

Light
Easy to Maintain
Maintenance Fees: -3,750 cbills / match

Heavy
Difficult To Maintain
Maintenance Fees: -7,500 cbills / match

Assault
Very Difficult To Maintain (least economically viable 'Mechs)
Maintenance Fees: -10,000 cbills / match

The addition of maintenance fees will help reduce the "arms race" in MWO. The maintenance fees above will be subtracted from your rewards every match. Since medium mechs are the workhorse mechs of the Inner Sphere, they have the lowest maintenance fees by design. The rationale behind this is there will be plenty of spare parts available to fix these mechs. Conversely, assault mechs are rare and you would expect the highest maintenance fees. Light and heavy mechs fall in between these two extremes. This will give players more incentive to pilot light and medium mechs on the battlefield, especially mediums. This will also help level the playing field for scout mechs, as the cbill rewards are rather lackluster. The reason the fees are relatively small is to prevent hurting the new player experience, but they will be noticeable.

With the current scoring system being heavily geared towards damage, you are gimping your earnings by taking anything other than a heavy or assault. You should have to decide to take the big guns and the accompanying high maintenance fees, or go with a light or medium mech with low maintenance fees. This system would promote more mech diversity on the battlefield, which is a huge improvement! Thoughts/Opinions?

Edited by Maverick01, 21 July 2013 - 08:40 PM.

[Kaeb Odellas]

Sounds an awful lot like R&R to me. I'm not sure this will really help. The rewards from kills and component destruction are going to more than make up for the fees, unless you make them really high, and even then that will only really hurt casuals and newbies.

[Volthorne]

Kaeb Odellas, on 20 July 2013 - 07:18 PM, said:

Sounds an awful lot like R&R to me. I'm not sure this will really help. The rewards from kills and component destruction are going to more than make up for the fees, unless you make them really high, and even then that will only really hurt casuals and newbies.

And Assault pilots. R&R basically turned MW:O into WoT where you ran Lights and Mediums to build up money to run your Heavies and Assaults for a few games.

[Phoenix Branson]

Kaeb Odellas, on 20 July 2013 - 07:18 PM, said:

Sounds an awful lot like R&R to me. I'm not sure this will really help. The rewards from kills and component destruction are going to more than make up for the fees, unless you make them really high, and even then that will only really hurt casuals and newbies.

The fees are designed to be relatively small, but noticeable. The reason the fees are small is to prevent hurting the new player experience. However, the extra cbills awarded for piloting medium and light mechs will incentivize said mechs. Plus, it will help reduce the arms race.

[James The Fox Dixon]

Maverick01, on 20 July 2013 - 06:39 PM, said:

Maintenance Fees by Weight Class

Medium
Very Easy to Maintain
Maintenance Fees: -1,000 cbills / match

Light
Easy to Maintain
Maintenance Fees: -2,500 cbills / match

Heavy
Difficult To Maintain
Maintenance Fees: -5,000 cbills / match

Assault
Very Difficult To Maintain
Maintenance Fees: -8,500 cbills / match

The addition of maintenance fees will help reduce the "arms race" currently in MWO. The maintenance fees above will be subtracted from your rewards every match. Since medium mechs are the workhorse mechs of the Inner Sphere, they have the lowest maintenance fees by design. The rationale behind this is there will be plenty of spare parts available to fix these mechs. Conversely, assault mechs are rare and you would expect the highest maintenance fees. Light and heavy mechs fall in between these two extremes. This will give players more incentive to pilot light and medium mechs on the battlefield, especially mediums. This will also help level the playing field for scout mechs, as the cbill rewards are rather lackluster. Thoughts/Opinions?

I voted no because you're punishing players that do not buy MC for premium time, so you've knocked out all of the free players. Balancing the game through economic punishment does not work. All it does is drive away free players that may spend money on the game. When R&R was around, I was a Cat pilot and I was punished severely for running my build. The punishment was so severe that I would lose money even on a win and I couldn't afford to buy my next variant to max my piloting skills. I will not play under a system that punishes players for playing what they want to play.

If you want variety like it was in the old days of closed beta and early open beta then the match maker has to change. It has to add in weight/class restrictions, so if you have 4 Atlases then you are matched against 4 Assaults. You also have to have rewards that match the roles each weight class fulfill in a match. Currently, the rewards only reward people that can do high damage. This leaves out Light and Medium mechs since they are limited in the weapons and equipment they can mount. Heavies and Assaults can mount weapons and equipment that are twice the weight of a Light and Medium mech, so they get all of the big rewards that are currently in place.

What's with Mediums being cheaper to run than lights? I believe I know the answer to that question as it shows your bias towards medium mechs.

Edited by James The Fox Dixon, 20 July 2013 - 08:16 PM.

[Corvus Antaka]

great idea - we need something like this too not only encourage lower wieght class play but more importantly to insure good pilots are in assaults especially when tonnage limits hit, this way better pilots make more money anyhow and get hit less by the fees.

your fees are too low though.

id go with more like 10,000 cbills a match for lights, 25,000 for mediums, 45,000 for heavies and 75,000 for assaults.

Edited by Colonel Pada Vinson, 20 July 2013 - 09:10 PM.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

It may be better to have a reduced payout at the end of the Match based on Class, than showing a subtraction as suggested, but I agree on the general concept to make Mediums the best economically viable option compared to other classes.

[Phoenix Branson]

Colonel Pada Vinson, on 20 July 2013 - 09:10 PM, said:

great idea - we need something like this too not only encourage lower wieght class play but more importantly to insure good pilots are in assaults especially when tonnage limits hit, this way better pilots make more money anyhow and get hit less by the fees.

your fees are too low though.

id go with more like 10,000 cbills a match for lights, 25,000 for mediums, 45,000 for heavies and 75,000 for assaults.

Maintenance fees can't be too high or you damage the new player experience.

Edited by Maverick01, 21 July 2013 - 05:49 PM.

[Hexenhammer]

Or we could do something silly like lower rewards over all and up the rewards for playing other weight classes. That way we're rewarding, not punishing.

Edited by Hexenhammer, 21 July 2013 - 05:52 PM.

[Phoenix Branson]

Hexenhammer, on 21 July 2013 - 05:52 PM, said:

Or we could do something silly like lower rewards over all and up the rewards for playing other weight classes. That way we're rewarding, not punishing.

I think adding maintenance fees adds a realistic element to the game.

[Drunk Canuck]

No, farming up C-Bills is already annoying enough without having hard earned money taken away from me.

[Phoenix Branson]

Drunk Canuck, on 21 July 2013 - 06:06 PM, said:

No, farming up C-Bills is already annoying enough without having hard earned money taken away from me.

This would actually level the playing field for all mechs as the current system rewards heavy and assault mechs by far with their damage potential. This system also adds more mech diversity on the battlefield, which is a huge improvement! There is really no downside to this system in my humble opinion.

Edited by Maverick01, 21 July 2013 - 06:21 PM.

[Mackman]

Maverick01, on 21 July 2013 - 06:20 PM, said:

This would actually level the playing field for all mechs as the current system rewards heavy and assault mechs by far with their damage potential. This system also adds more mech diversity on the battlefield, which is a huge improvement! There is really no downside to this system in my humble opinion.

No downside to your level of maintenance fees? Sure. I'd be totally fine with what you proposed: it's probably about right as far as evening out the earnings goes, and I won't argue with that. But I hope you agree that Colonel Pada's numbers are waaaaaaay too high.

[Phoenix Branson]

Mackman, on 21 July 2013 - 06:25 PM, said:

No downside to your level of maintenance fees? Sure. I'd be totally fine with what you proposed: it's probably about right as far as evening out the earnings goes, and I won't argue with that. But I hope you agree that Colonel Pada's numbers are waaaaaaay too high.

Yes. I agree the Colonel's fees would be way to high for MWO.

[Phoenix Branson]

Bump

[Kyrs]

Like the concept of encouraging other weight class then assault, but instead I would have given a bonus to general xp for light and medium.

Edited by Kyrs, 22 July 2013 - 01:21 PM.