471 replies to this topic

[Victor Morson]

LastPaladin, on 06 July 2013 - 10:25 PM, said:

The money quotes from the dev team:

"Those PPCs are devastating"

"Paul, your game is unbalanced and broken"

Funny stuff.

I liked "We have to rush them, because they can't sustain fire!" or something to that effect. Oh, you poor, poor ER Large toting dead man walking..

http://www.twitch.tv/piranhagames/b/426379176

Some of my favorites from the second video include "Drop an Airstrike on the point NOW!" "Run away, I dropped an airstrike!" It's like one of those movies where people run away from an explosion and it's just a little "Pop."

[Kageru Ikazuchi]

This is how imbalances should be demonstrated, at the right level, and why this was important 2, 3, and 4 months ago. It's a shame that it has taken so long, and I'm not sure that Paul's solution will even help.

So, which will be louder, the QQ'ing or the cheering when PPCs and/or convergence get the nerf they desperately need?

My vote is QQ, while the spreadsheet warriors try to figure out what the next flavor of cheese tastes like.

[LastPaladin]

Victor Morson, on 06 July 2013 - 11:05 PM, said:

I liked "We have to rush them, because they can't sustain fire!" or something to that effect. Oh, you poor, poor ER Large toting dead man walking..

http://www.twitch.tv/piranhagames/b/426379176

Some of my favorites from the second video include "Drop an Airstrike on the point NOW!" "Run away, I dropped an airstrike!" It's like one of those movies where people run away from an explosion and it's just a little "Pop."

I didn't even watch the second one yet. They actually use airstrikes? I think I've been targeted by one once, and I was like "oh this is interesting, let me move 30 meters over here and then back to my position".

[The Cheese]

LastPaladin, on 06 July 2013 - 11:21 PM, said:

I didn't even watch the second one yet. They actually use airstrikes? I think I've been targeted by one once, and I was like "oh this is interesting, let me move 30 meters over here and then back to my position".

You move?

[LastPaladin]

The Cheese, on 06 July 2013 - 11:24 PM, said:

You move?

Well, I'd never seen em before, I thought they might actually hurt

[Edustaja]

Playing the 8-man game surely demonstrated them the current meta...
They should invite some good players to play as they watch to see how the game looks when played properly.
Now it's just a stompfest for their inexperienced and uncoordinated team.
They would have lost against any other team, ppc's or not. PPC fest just makes it that much more evident.

[Victor Morson]

Edustaja, on 07 July 2013 - 02:04 AM, said:

Playing the 8-man game surely demonstrated them the current meta...
They should invite some good players to play as they watch to see how the game looks when played properly.
Now it's just a stompfest for their inexperienced and uncoordinated team.
They would have lost against any other team, ppc's or not. PPC fest just makes it that much more evident.

I have repeatedly said that they should open email communication with competitive teams.

Both PGI and many PUGs take this as a "we hate newbies, we only care about high end balance!" message I think, when it's really not. Knowledgeable people balancing a game = a well balanced game, and we cannot expect the devs to stay up to date on the latest meta on their own. They need to open lines of communication and really listen to it.

Half of the reason many of our predictions and warnings went ignored was all the PUG white noise coming in and saying how Frankenbuilds would work, and how you don't need weight, and how you couldn't run PPCs all the time, etc. (See my SIG for some choice moments of that) - you really cannot let them have a say in balance, or it will ruin the game for them, too.

I really hope PGI does in fact consider making that one final step, if they have not already. In fact I would highly endorse SJR as a good team to talk to. I'm glad they encountered PGI because they represent some of the better players in the current meta.

[Demuder]

Victor Morson, on 07 July 2013 - 03:06 AM, said:

....
Half of the reason many of our predictions and warnings went ignored was all the PUG white noise coming in and saying how Frankenbuilds would work, and how you don't need weight, and how you couldn't run PPCs all the time, etc. (See my SIG for some choice moments of that) - you really cannot let them have a say in balance, or it will ruin the game for them, too.
....

As far as the current situation with the PPC and boating is concerned, the "white noise" as you describe it can't be blamed. It's simple numbers: alpha vs location damage and how often you can do it. It's not like those builds couldn't be predicted on paper.

[Victor Morson]

dimstog, on 07 July 2013 - 12:05 PM, said:

As far as the current situation with the PPC and boating is concerned, the "white noise" as you describe it can't be blamed. It's simple numbers: alpha vs location damage and how often you can do it. It's not like those builds couldn't be predicted on paper.

Check my sig out. You'd think that and I agree, it is easily predictable on paper - to the point I specifically showed a great deal of concern about the PPC just dominating the entire field without restrictive slots.

Naysayer after naysayer did not care. They'd only talk about outranging you with AC/2s, how you couldn't hold up to a mixed build, etc. All the time, in every thread that talked about it - but you'll also find those quotes in my sig thread.

I agree, for for a MechWarrior veteran this is easy to predict on paper but apparently it was not easy for the devs (whom didn't ever really seriously play in leagues, from my understanding) to forsee, and TONS of PUG white noise insisting that they would be able to destroy PPCs with a "balanced force" was overwhelming.

We still see it today. Every time a logical argument is put forth it's often met with either "Nuh-uh my Frakenbuild will defeat you! It's about skill not your 'mech!" (LOL) or "If we only directly converted every dice role from BattleTech..." which is equally unhelpful.

[RG Notch]

Victor Morson, on 07 July 2013 - 01:06 PM, said:

Check my sig out. You'd think that and I agree, it is easily predictable on paper - to the point I specifically showed a great deal of concern about the PPC just dominating the entire field without restrictive slots.

Naysayer after naysayer did not care. They'd only talk about outranging you with AC/2s, how you couldn't hold up to a mixed build, etc. All the time, in every thread that talked about it - but you'll also find those quotes in my sig thread.

I agree, for for a MechWarrior veteran this is easy to predict on paper but apparently it was not easy for the devs (whom didn't ever really seriously play in leagues, from my understanding) to forsee, and TONS of PUG white noise insisting that they would be able to destroy PPCs with a "balanced force" was overwhelming.

We still see it today. Every time a logical argument is put forth it's often met with either "Nuh-uh my Frakenbuild will defeat you! It's about skill not your 'mech!" (LOL) or "If we only directly converted every dice role from BattleTech..." which is equally unhelpful.

Why do they even have these forums where the lowly PUG noise makers can post amongst the Illuminati? They should require a certain Elo score to even post on these forums. How else can the wheat be separated from the lowly chaff without public Elo and PGI getting in direct contact on an hourly basis with the top "competitive" teams to approve any potential changes.
How else can the Elo Elite save the PUGs from themselves? How else can the warm enlightening glow of their wisdom bathe the unwashed and rebuild them into min maxers? How else can the "competitive" player bask in his glory reflected in the upturned faces of those who need them to be able to have fun? I mean these people somehow think one can have fun without min maxing, without running the FotM build, without winning by any means necessary? How dumb are these people who don't even know that they are doing it wrong without help?

[Kageru Ikazuchi]

RG Notch, on 07 July 2013 - 01:41 PM, said:

I mean these people somehow think one can have fun without min maxing, without running the FotM build, without winning by any means necessary?

Snipped for brevity, and to remove most of the obvious sarcasm. I usually comment here that it's not my intent to take your point out of context ... but in this case, that would be BS ... it's out of context because the rest of it is mostly noise.

While I do play "spread sheet warrior", I almost never adapt my builds to match the current "meta-game". I know I'm not playing the "best" mech ... my favorite HGN is a brawler -733C (AC/20, 2x ML, 2x SRM-6). I don't care. I'm having fun. I'm not competing for anything even moderately important.

I used to believe that a game balanced for the masses would work ... and it will, until the competitive players, who study the game, optimize their mechs to win more and build something truly overpowered ... the FOTM. If the FOTM lasts long enough, then the masses start to be significantly affected by it ... you see them in every level of play, and the game will have a hard time recovering.

• The incredibly skilled or just competitive players will adapt ... if the game gets boring, they will leave. If a FOTM survives the balance tweaks for more than a few weeks, things will get boring.
  
• The decent-to-good players who embraced the cheese will see their Elo over-inflated until the nerf bat swings ... they'll either adapt to the new FOTM or complain that the game has been broken beyond repair and rage quit.
  
• The decent-to-good players who did not run the FOTM (me, for example) will have a rough time ... most games will be ROFL stomps ... if they're die-hard fans (me), they'll weather the storm ... if they're not, they'll probably find another game to play.
  
• The new and bad players will always have a hard time ... particularly until we have some form of beginner's tutorial, private matches, and/or replays.

The FOTM's dominance will first manifest itself in the competitive play, and balance can be tweaked early so that it doesn't affect the masses significantly, but for that to happen, the developers need to be either closely following the competitive games or in open communication with the competitive players.

Edit: reduced wall of text to something a bit shorter.

Edited by Kageru Ikazuchi, 07 July 2013 - 04:25 PM.

[Zerstorer Stallin]

FOTM builds and the "best" players is a joke. The problems are not weapon balance, its easy to see its convergence, and a no limit MECHLAB. Geezzss I'm amazed how hard most people are trying to make this based on some fantasy they won't be players if the mechlab is reworked. They drop the 3rd person bomb and the coolant bomb and yet the game marches on... for now at least.

[MischiefSC]

I will say this. I'm rethinking my opinion on 3PV -

I want it. I want it badly -

In the test zone, so that in October I can spin in circles around my Battlemaster and tell her she's a pretty, pretty girl.

I will pilot that mech naked.

[Joseph Mallan]

MischiefSC, on 08 July 2013 - 03:22 PM, said:

I will say this. I'm rethinking my opinion on 3PV -

I want it. I want it badly -

In the test zone, so that in October I can spin in circles around my Battlemaster and tell her she's a pretty, pretty girl.

I will pilot that mech naked.

Someone else Gets It!

[Victor Morson]

Zerstorer Stallin, on 08 July 2013 - 03:09 PM, said:

FOTM builds and the "best" players is a joke. The problems are not weapon balance, its easy to see its convergence, and a no limit MECHLAB. Geezzss I'm amazed how hard most people are trying to make this based on some fantasy they won't be players if the mechlab is reworked. They drop the 3rd person bomb and the coolant bomb and yet the game marches on... for now at least.

I wish people would make this two arguments. They are NOT the same thing.

First off, gun balance is out of whack. It needs to be fixed. There shouldn't be so many broken or terrible guns, with only a few good ones and a couple that are perhaps a tad too good. That's where we're at now.

Second.. most of us aren't disputing adding more hardpoint restrictions. My reasoning is that otherwise we are nearing a point where we'll have a few "good" mechs and everything else will be trash, because there's already getting to be a flood that can do the same thing in similar tonnage packages.

So most of us saying gun balance are not against hardpoint restrictions, but gun balance is also not because of hardpoint restrictions. They're two different problems with two different solutions.

[MischiefSC]

Joseph Mallan, on 08 July 2013 - 07:05 PM, said:

Someone else Gets It!

Summer, 1986. I'm in the only gaming shop in my town, there in the window is Citytech boxed set right next to Battletech. On the cover is the Spartan Archer, which I recognized from Macross. So I flip through it and see the Battlemaster. They even had a model of it for sale (all the writing of it was in Japanese but I recognized the mech) and this tube full of mech blueprints - which included the Battlemaster.

A week of picking cherries later and it was ALL MINE. That model was fully poseable - even the PPC came out of the hand and the missiles went in and out of the launcher. It had room for 2 pilots but screw them - that was MY mech. That model was one of my favorite toys for a few years. Those poster sized blueprints went on my wall and got studied in detail. After all that I learned to play the game with some friends.

The Battlemaster was a beast. Excellent balance of weapons across all ranges, 6MLs all but guaranteed a hit at medium range and the PPC had decent odds of peeling most if not all the armor off a Stinger or other light well outside their range. 4/6 movement let it keep up with most of the mediums and its armor let easily outlast them up close. The Marauder may have looked like an Officers battlepod but the Battlemaster could consistently strip 30 or 40 points off some poor ******* in a single round, brawl like a fiend and threaten anyone at any range. Oh, and a couple of machineguns, because F**K YOU, that's why.

I totally get it. That mech made the game for me.

[MustrumRidcully]

Victor Morson, on 08 July 2013 - 07:05 PM, said:

I wish people would make this two arguments. They are NOT the same thing.

First off, gun balance is out of whack. It needs to be fixed. There shouldn't be so many broken or terrible guns, with only a few good ones and a couple that are perhaps a tad too good. That's where we're at now.

Second.. most of us aren't disputing adding more hardpoint restrictions. My reasoning is that otherwise we are nearing a point where we'll have a few "good" mechs and everything else will be trash, because there's already getting to be a flood that can do the same thing in similar tonnage packages.

So most of us saying gun balance are not against hardpoint restrictions, but gun balance is also not because of hardpoint restrictions. They're two different problems with two different solutions.

I disupse hard point restrictions. I think they lessen one of the cool features of the game, without a guarantee that it will actually fix balance problems, since the game uses stock mechs as basis that were never designed around it being particularly OP to boat weapons. Some do, many don't. But the some that do will be a problem.

And I fear that in the end we sit with a tight customization system that doesn't leave much to explore and experiment, plus all the problems we already have now. And we know at least since ECM that once PGI has decided to implement something, they're not backing off*. So if hard point customziation doesn'T improve balance, and takes out the fun of the game, they'll stick to it.

Here's my MW:O optimization theorem:
Group Fire, Balance, Convergence. Pick any two.


*) weirdly enough, there's one exception. R&R. Maybe there is more hope than I give them credit for.

Edited by MustrumRidcully, 09 July 2013 - 12:22 AM.

[Zerstorer Stallin]

If anyone is listen ... which I seriously don't think they are, might be time to you know... do something.

[Victor Morson]

And, sadly, the latest changes show they are still well within their bubble. Mushing ahead with all their previous plans after promises of listening and big changes.

I swear, it's leading to their downfall.


(I know it's an old thing but it's too fitting at this point.)

[jakucha]

Victor Morson, on 12 July 2013 - 11:17 PM, said:

And, sadly, the latest changes show they are still well within their bubble. Mushing ahead with all their previous plans after promises of listening and big changes.

I swear, it's leading to their downfall.


(I know it's an old thing but it's too fitting at this point.)

Ah, yes, welcome to "The Sky is Always Falling" with your host, Victor Morson.