Prosperity Park, on 03 July 2013 - 09:14 AM, said:
Support is working on trying to resolve new problems that have cropped up with the Movement code. Specifically, the
Pebbles of Steel.
The new movement code is meant to help balance gameplay in respect to emphasizing mobility as a strength on the battlefield, but the new code has caused some significant mobility problems. Light and Medium Mechs are being stopped-cold by
small rocks and things, which is resulting in easy potshots upon them. All Mechs are affected by this Pebble of Steel effect, too, but it's particularly bad when your Jenner is cruising along at full tilt and you suddenly slow-down to "Target Speed" for no reason.
In an effort to improve gameplay, the Support Team is soliciting help to identify the map/grid locations of these evil little caltrop pebbles.
Here's a link to the thread where information is being requested, and a quote of it:
The problem isn't pebbles. The problem is massively abrupt speed falloffs that happen on every slant. Fixing each and every one of these is flat out stupid because even getting one of your feet too close to an incline will dead stop you.
The movement system is
utter trash, and if you fix the momentum falloff and stop trying to gimp 'mechs from accessing terrain, all the problems will go away. Normally I think this would be a great thing that you're reaching out, but the first time the support team reaches out, it's for something like this.
The entire movement system is broken at it's core. Please don't go around flattening out the maps because of it.
Prosperity Park, on 03 July 2013 - 09:14 AM, said:
So, aside from reporting the Pebbles problem, I'd like to know if people think this new mevement Code has affected Gameplay balance from the perspective of Mobility vs Firepower. From the beginning of the game, all Mechs traveled like extremely torquey wheeled vehicles, effortlessly "rolling" up and down most hills. This was most evident in the chases that take place around small, rolling hills.
The new tiers in the movement code will have a big effect when it comes to chases that take place between Mechs of different movement tiers among rolling hills, specifically because you'll see Top Speed changes for one Mech while the other Mech retains it's full Top Speed. That change, alone, will have a huge impact on the tactics of "Light Hunting" by larger, up-engined Mechs. They won't be able to maintain 80kph over rolling hills to chase that fleeing Light before it gets out of range...
I want to say that I
absolutely love the concept behind the movement system, in the speed reductions. I think making assaults
crawl up terrain where lights can manage it at only a slight penalty would be a huge shot in the arm to medium and light 'mechs
, as well as smaller heavies. I'd even like this speed boost applied to other terrain types as well, such as deep water for eventual swamp maps. The idea that on some terrain assaults have heavily penalized movement is a good thing.
What is
positively not a good thing is removing the ability to access much of the map's terrain, in particular when the falloff is such that you can almost crest a hill and then simply grind to a halt near the top of it. It is also
not a good thing when a high speed medium can't even clear snow drifts on Alpine.. not the hills, I'm talking snow drifts.
MechWarrior: Online previously had a
completely fine "cut-off" point as to what height level you can reach; literally nobody was going to places they shouldn't be going. Someone got this system way off when they made it about dead-stopping 'mechs to 0, rather than drastically reducing their movement speed. One is incredibly,
incredibly frustrating and the other is a buff to light 'mechs.
The other big problem, again, is speed falloff. Once you hit an inappropriate angle it loses speed
fast. If you walk over a mount of dirt or push close to a slanted wall with a medium or light, your speed will suddenly plummet like a rock. There's no "momentum carrying you forwards" that was suggested. If there was, things like the "Pebbles of Steel" wouldn't actually be happening, because the 'mech would only lose a few KPH and keep going, rather than turning into a medium weight kick me sign.
Prosperity Park, on 03 July 2013 - 09:14 AM, said:
Does anyone else see this as being a major change on the field? or does Light Hunting not play as strong of a role for this to matter much?... or am I totally off base on this?
It is a major change, and again, if this movement system had the same level of terrain accessibility we had previously but
performance was impacted on terrain, this would be an awesome help to medium and light 'mechs. The bigger the 'mech, the harder the penalty on "rough/steep terrain" and you have a fine system. But
it should never reduce a 'mechs speed to 0, or a least do so very gradually. At least, not until it would have reached "impassable" levels prior to the patch. I'm not saying we should be able to climb stuff we could not previously, just that actual
map accessibility should remain the same.
I know some people are in favor of blocking off much of the maps, but I will tell you the biggest problem with that hands down: It turns the game into a
Corridor Shooter. There's no getting around it. If you try to jam most players into very specific locations and try to artificially limit their routes, the game immediately ceases to be MechWarrior and turns into every other FPS out there. 'mechs being really mobile is one of the best things MW:O has done so far, and this totally ruins it.
TL/DR: Make the speed drop off much slower, make the minimum speed something other than 0, penalize lights/mediums even less and heavies/assaults even more and you won't need to fix the "pebbles of steel" because the problem will resolve itself.
Also for all the good intentions of this path, "rocking back and forth map monkeying up hills" is the result and that is lame. Very, very lame.
PS: Most of my first hand experience has been in moderately quick 50 tonners, whom I figured would have an edge over assaults and be able to handle terrain easier. I'm getting ground to a halt on every little slope or angle that my 'mech hits, but even if it's only for a second, it's a death sentence.
PPS: Nothing is as
frustrating as a stuck spot or invisible wall in a game, and this has pretty much turned the maps into a series of invisible walls. When the player can see a location they want to move to, and feels like if they took one or two steps they could be there, yet is stuck it's just really.. angering. Some of us veterans that have spent years monkeying up hills in MW4 are doing better than others but this has got to frustrate new players horrendously.
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