21 replies to this topic

[Belial]

Alrighty,

So every MW game has had its own version of a 'Mech's death upon getting its reactor killed.

MW2: The individual pieces fly apart to some fire animation. Simple but fun.

MW3: More varied. Collapse due to destroyed leg, short-circuit sound and full collapse upon CT destruction, and more rarely a full explosion for too much heat or ammo cookoff (I never had an ammo explosion though so I can only go off hearsay on that bit).

MW4: Light pours from the damaged reactor housing, followed by a decent explosion, leaving a charred silhouette of the 'Mech.

What should it be like in this game? The trailer seemed to replicate MW4's version but on a bigger scale. Also, I know it gets a lot of flak, but the explosions in MechAssault seemed to be spot-on if a fusion reactor goes critical. But now technology can let it be varied depending on how the 'Mech was killed. Ammo explosion or full reactor breach? KA-BOOM. Simple depletion of CT or cockpit? Maybe it can fall over, on fire, like in MW3.

Any thoughts?

[Halfinax]

How it was destroyed should undoubtedly be the determining factor.

[Hayden]

I also like the notion of 'mechs occasionally dying standing up: you see something like this with the Atlas in the MW2 Mercs intro and I think in MW1. I liked the notion of seeing an atlas gutted by explosion yet still looming meaniicingly: You know it can't hurt you, yet you still feel a sense of dread looking at it. EDIT: Maybe that should only happen if the 'mech stands still.

Otherwise, I'm inclined to agree about MW3: if the death sequences were a bit more suitable, but going critical and internal ammo explosions should still be possible.

Halfinax, on 09 November 2011 - 02:12 PM, said:

How it was destroyed should undoubtedly be the determining factor.

Agreed!

Edited by hayden, 09 November 2011 - 02:14 PM.

[Logan McCann]

I like the Idea of having the Mech fall down if legs get shot out. Ect. Big Explosions all the time is not true to the Board game anyway. Stackpooling a Mech is not a easy thing to do after all.

[fett]

What I don't like about leg kills is that the mech might be down, but not out.

In PnP game, mechs with arms could prop themselves up and fire from a disadvantged position (or even choose to be prone!). You would never want to find yourself there because being still and only having a certain arc of fire make you easy prey fro anyone but a foolish attacker.

I'd like:
head shot - your mech just slumps down but the gyro keeps it standing
engine blow - boom!
leg destroyed - the mech is not dead until someone comes and gives it the death blow (and possibly it could fire back with limited accuracy).

[torgian]

Reading the fiction can give you all these variables.

Ammo booms... it depends. In most Inner Sphere mechs, especially those without the CASE system, an ammo boom is pretty much death by multiple explosions. The neurohelmet feedback alone can fry a pilot's brain. The Clans mitigated this damage, especially with the CASE system, which basically blows the ammo out of the affected area, preventing damage to the fusion reactor. However, most Inner Sphere mechs before the 3050 era do not have CASE I believe. So, an ammo boom should show multiple smaller explosions, and if there's enough ammo to destroy a mech, well, there you go.

As far as the BIG reactor explosions, those are fairly rare. Those only happen if the fail-safes on the fusion reactor... fail. If they don't shut the reactor down, THEN the reactor goes critical, resulting in a big explosion. However, this only happens if there are multiple engine hits, or if the fail-safes fail themselves.

Coring a mech (CTing it, or destroying the center torso) usually means dealing enough damage to ruin the internal structure and/or destroy the engine and cause a reactor shutdown. This also usually means the Gyro is destroyed.

legging should be simulated so that you can still prop yourself up and fire away if you can.

A head decapitation has different results in the books. Sometimes, a decapitation can just cause the mech to fall. Sometimes, the mech will lock into place, as if it was shutdown, so there's a chance that the mech can still be standing if the cockpit isn't shot off while it's in motion.

[PewPew]

Belial, on 09 November 2011 - 02:02 PM, said:

Also, I know it gets a lot of flak, but the explosions in MechAssault seemed to be spot-on if a fusion reactor goes critical.

You've seen a lot of fusion reactors go critical in your day? Ah, right. They don't exist.

Meaning it's what you imagine it should look like. With that in consideration, the appearance of things is likely going to be directed by the artists, as to have everything fit in a sort of theme that the artist(s) will create. I, personally, trust the visuals in this game to be more than just fine so far. If it maintains the same direction, things will be grand. Hopefully, that puts you at some ease.

[Belial]

PewPew, on 09 November 2011 - 06:16 PM, said:

You've seen a lot of fusion reactors go critical in your day? Ah, right. They don't exist.

Meaning it's what you imagine it should look like. With that in consideration, the appearance of things is likely going to be directed by the artists, as to have everything fit in a sort of theme that the artist(s) will create. I, personally, trust the visuals in this game to be more than just fine so far. If it maintains the same direction, things will be grand. Hopefully, that puts you at some ease.

Ah, quite a fair point. Indeed, it was exactly what I imagined. Thanks for the clarification.

[EagleFire]

I vote for MWLL deaths. Nothing as satisfying as physics taking hold of a mech as it dies. One of the best things that can happen is seeing an Owens running at full speed with MASC taking a heavy gauss shot to the leg and tumbling for 300 meters.

[Miles Tails Prower]

EagleFire, on 09 November 2011 - 09:06 PM, said:

I vote for MWLL deaths. Nothing as satisfying as physics taking hold of a mech as it dies. One of the best things that can happen is seeing an Owens running at full speed with MASC taking a heavy gauss shot to the leg and tumbling for 300 meters.

I agree. If the game's engine allows for momentum physics like skidding across the ground after being knocked over, that would be very cool just to see.

[Zakatak]

If the killshot exceeds the damage threshold by 30% and hits the torso, the fusion reaction touches the reactor walls, boiler explosion of 0.5 kilotons or so.

Headshot, blood smears the cockpit windshield, mech continues moving at the set throttle setting for 5 seconds, then collapses.

Anything else? MW3 had it right.

Edited by Zakatak, 09 November 2011 - 10:04 PM.

[Cake Bandit]

EagleFire, on 09 November 2011 - 09:06 PM, said:

I vote for MWLL deaths. Nothing as satisfying as physics taking hold of a mech as it dies. One of the best things that can happen is seeing an Owens running at full speed with MASC taking a heavy gauss shot to the leg and tumbling for 300 meters.

Even if it wasn't quite as blinding, I'd still like to see the individual parts of the mech get caught by the meltdown. Imagine being damaged and pushed because an arm or leg bounced off your mech.

[man o war]

Zakatak, on 09 November 2011 - 10:00 PM, said:

If the killshot exceeds the damage threshold by 30% and hits the torso, the fusion reaction touches the reactor walls, boiler explosion of 0.5 kilotons or so.

Headshot, blood smears the cockpit windshield, mech continues moving at the set throttle setting for 5 seconds, then collapses.

Anything else? MW3 had it right.

I totally agree.

Belial, on 09 November 2011 - 02:02 PM, said:

What should it be like in this game? The trailer seemed to replicate MW4's version but on a bigger scale. Also, I know it gets a lot of flak, but the explosions in MechAssault seemed to be spot-on if a fusion reactor goes critical. But now technology can let it be varied depending on how the 'Mech was killed. Ammo explosion or full reactor breach? KA-BOOM. Simple depletion of CT or cockpit? Maybe it can fall over, on fire, like in MW3.

Any thoughts?

A fusion reactor cannot go "critical" i.e. explode like in the trailer. In fact, even the canon goes against that: http://www.sarna.net...i/Fusion_Engine
Experimental fusion reactors do in fact exist today (e.g. tokamaks). It's physically impossible for a fusion engine to have a run-away chain reaction like a nuclear bomb. The moment the reactor is breached, the plasma will ignite the air, and the various containment magnets will probably blow apart and whatnot, but essentially the reacting plasma is cooled in the process and it's just a conventional explosion.
Like Zakatek said, the boiler/turbine/generator can get hit too, which wouldn't yield nearly as large of an explosion but will disable the mech just as well. So maybe coring a mech will "quietly" put it down half the time, and the other half will have the plasma/air explosion.

[Nik Van Rhijn]

I agree with Man O' War, just hope they have some "pretty" deaths we can enjoy - even when it's us

[VYCanis]

i want to see something like this for ammo fires, not an instant kaboom, more like your mech's insides are being hollowed out by an out of control chain reaction of fire, the exterior barely keeping it together. maybe a boom at the end. but i just like the visual of the flames and sparks straining to get through every possible seam.

[Colddawg]

I vote on a mixture plus something new. Having the limb blow offs of MW2, the crackling of MW3, the explosions of MWLL...all that mixed together would probably be the right way to go.

The devs should keep in mind that these are massive machines with lots of electronics, structures, and munitions stored aboard them. The "dynamics of death" are varying and quite dramatic for these machines. Yet they can also be as simple as the 'Mech stops dead in its tracks due to pilot death or that it is just incapacitated to the point where it does not work anymore.

[Red Beard]

Belial, on 09 November 2011 - 02:02 PM, said:

the explosions in MechAssault seemed to be spot-on

The graphics and effects in MechAssault were light years beyond any of the other silly MW games, and so too were the explosions. The only thing I would have changed is to have variations on the size and type of explosions, but otherwise, yeah. Most MW games had terrible graphics and sorry explosions. MA did all of those things right, by a long shot. Check out YT to see some of the best examples of what a mech that is blowing up should look like.

[Glare]

MechWarrior 3 had the best to date implementation of 'Mech destruction. True to canon, true to non-optional tabletop rules, and true to all but a handful of deliberate exceptions (and Michael Stackpole. There's a reason it's called a Stackpole when a fusion engine goes up), 'Mech fusion engines do not detonate on center torso destruction.

The only way for a fusion engine to detonate even with the optional rules on is to get a roll of 10 or higher (on 2d6), approximately a 16.67% chance, when the engine has taken four or more hits that turn. Torso destruction in and of itself does not count for engine hits. That's right, the engine actually has to take four distinct critical hits in one turn. The engine only has six critical slots, and does not occupy the entire center torso.

tl;dr detonating fusion engines are borderline-idiotic and should have no place in this game. How would you get salvage if the entire 'Mech detonated in a flurry of blue-white energy anyway?

[Alizabeth Aijou]

Logan McCann, on 09 November 2011 - 02:52 PM, said:

I like the Idea of having the Mech fall down if legs get shot out. Ect. Big Explosions all the time is not true to the Board game anyway. Stackpooling a Mech is not a easy thing to do after all.

Word.
No Stackpoling please.
Even TechManual states that its only really possible if the pilot actively tries to do so.

[CaveMan]

Alizabeth Aijou, on 11 November 2011 - 01:52 PM, said:

Word.
No Stackpoling please.
Even TechManual states that its only really possible if the pilot actively tries to do so.

QFMFT.

*BOOM* means ammo cookoff. Besides, if reactors went critical and 'sploded all mushroomy-style, there would be no point in ejecting. You'd just be killed by the pulse of neutron radiation.