35 replies to this topic

[skullman86]

-My biggest problem with the game right now is the hardpoint system. I think the proposed ideas would do a lot more to give us well defined variant roles than the current system does.

-While I like the heatsink dispersion idea, I don't think I agree with variant based thresholds. Unseen, non-uniform values for heat could over complicate things where I think heatsinks alone could do the trick. With the right numbers for threshold and heatsink dispersion, players could improve dispersion rates on boats by just stacking more sinks. High alpha builds would be hot, but the rate of dispersion would be fast enough that the loadout would still be usable.

-I agree, Ferro needs a resistance multiplier or additional armor per ton.

-Most of the weapon changes seem reasonable. I especially like the DPS change for pulse lasers -- that is something I've wanted to see for a while.

-Matchmaker's inner workings is over my head, but (attempted) tonnage matching would be an improvement for sure. BV could be pretty useful, but with tonnage matchups it might not be necessary. No, the mechs wont be on perfectly equal ground, but tonnage matching goes pretty far when you compare it to what we have now. Also, ECM needs to be counted and matched regardless what weighing system they use...it's a really powerful tool and it should be kept in check.

-I agree that mech scale needs to be looked at. PGI knows and it seems like there is a small glimmer of hope.

Spoiler

http://mwomercs.com/...vs-42-answered/

Quote

Admittedly; given the time, I would like to make a couple tweaks here and there, but it’s not as easy as one might assume.

Edited by skullman86, 21 July 2013 - 05:51 PM.

[Kaio-Kerensky x10]

This is harsh, but I think a lot of these proposals have unclear goals, or are a roundabout way to accomplish the stated goals. Even the raw discussion is more focused on "I think PGI should do this..." rather than "This is a problem, because of X, Y, and Z, and it can be fixed by..."

I'd be curious to see what the problems are, rather than trying to deduce the problems that you're trying to solve from the solutions.

[John MatriX82]

valkyrie, on 21 July 2013 - 04:21 PM, said:

I think the heat penalty could have a place, but it NEEDS TO BE CLEARLY STATED. That means something like a tutorial will be necessary and soon. Otherwise, something like the Warhawk Prime, with its 4 Clan ER PPCs, is going to utterly dominate the meta the moment it hits, assuming the Dire Wolf doesn't precede it.

It needs to be stated clearly for sure, in this UI 2.0 might help. Yet you're right about the masakari, albeit as far as I remember clan ER ppcs would be extremely hotter than IS versions; some kind of heat penalty might still stay, but yet despite I like creativity, I dislike a lot being able to stuff impossible configurations because of the free hardpoint system..

[627]

I would like to see more heat penalties. Before hitting 100% heat.

BT was always about "too much heat", i think this should be a main balancing fact.

no penalties until 50% heat, after that, start blurring the vision. At 60%, lert the hud flicker, at 70, let the mech move slower, at 80 give it a widely visible glow or steam or heated air sign, so everyone knows that mech will overheat soon.
at least, at 90 you _could_ add a possible ammo explosion, but that is really a hard decision and needs to be tested carefully.

This won't affect a stalker with a 4ppc alpha, but it would effectively kill his aim for the second shot. It would be a soft counter to alpha-striking, some more risk/reward/consequnence.

[MustrumRidcully]

John MatriX82, on 21 July 2013 - 11:12 PM, said:

It needs to be stated clearly for sure, in this UI 2.0 might help. Yet you're right about the masakari, albeit as far as I remember clan ER ppcs would be extremely hotter than IS versions; some kind of heat penalty might still stay, but yet despite I like creativity, I dislike a lot being able to stuff impossible configurations because of the free hardpoint system..

Clan ER PPCs are hotter as IS PPCs, but not hotter as Clan ER PPCs. to compensate, they deal more damage, weigh less, and need less space.

And by compensate I don't mean in the balance way, more in the... "My other car is a Porsche" way.

[Unbound Inferno]

skullman86, on 21 July 2013 - 05:48 PM, said:

-I agree, Ferro needs a resistance multiplier or additional armor per ton.

This caught my attention.

What if Ferro was based per ton to add a % resistance and % armor amount? Heavier you are, more Armor and bigger resistance.

The larger mechs would benefit from being tough as nails, while the smaller only gains a slight edge over the standard counterparts.

This isn't Battletech, so I know some tweaking is needed tomake it playable - so thing really against making it like that.

[Orzorn]

MustrumRidcully, on 21 July 2013 - 05:12 PM, said:

Write the system up, and then play with it. How much options do you really still have with it?

In my experience, that's where this falls flat - if you cannot upgrade any weapons devoted to one hard point, then there is no point in downgrading something else, you just cannot use the weight or crit slots you gained from that for anything. At best you can add some more heat sinks or a larger engine, but that's really limited and boring.

Several mechs, particularly heavier ones, got hardpoints that were one level larger than the weapon that came in them. The dragon 1C, for instance, got two medium size hardpoints in the shoulder even though medium lasers (small energy) came by default.

[Gallowglas]

I *love* the suggestion of making pulse lasers fire continuously (and generate heat accordingly) as long as you hold down the fire key. This would make them feel like a completely different weapon with its own advantages and disadvantages instead of it seeming to always being balanced directly against the standard variants. It would also feel like more variety to gameplay.

In a similar vein, I liked (a lot) the suggestion given by someone a few days ago about PPC's requiring a charge time, determined by how long you hold down the fire key. You can fire at any time, but it would do reduced damage if you released before full charge.

I also really liked your suggestion of making ferro-fibrous reduce damage instead of weight. That makes the decision a lot more nuanced.

Edited by Gallowglas, 23 July 2013 - 01:42 PM.

[Cycleboy]

Unbound Inferno, on 22 July 2013 - 03:44 AM, said:

This caught my attention.

What if Ferro was based per ton to add a % resistance and % armor amount? Heavier you are, more Armor and bigger resistance.

The larger mechs would benefit from being tough as nails, while the smaller only gains a slight edge over the standard counterparts.

This isn't Battletech, so I know some tweaking is needed tomake it playable - so thing really against making it like that.

In a rambling post a while back I suggested something like this... let FF make the max armor for each section be +3% per weight range (12% for assaults) or something as well as making armor plates weight less (so for same weight you get +X% armor in each section). That would deviate from TT, but make role-warfare in teams more "game like"... the "Tank-role" of the less armed, but very armored spear-head. Gets focused fired... and laughs... as his team spreads out from behind to get shots off.

I like the Pulses being continuous fire blasts... I'd think 1.5x DPS or more as you hold the trigger, but 2x Heat. That way, if you are cool and are willing to keep facing an enemy (exposed to coring out), you can drop some serious damage. Would make pulses a "striker" weapon. Rush in... unload... run out to cool. I know assaults will be even more afraid of Jenners and Ravens though... if they sneak up on you, your backside is toast.

[Trauglodyte]

valkyrie, on 20 July 2013 - 05:19 PM, said:

...aka, "The Garth Project." Those of you who listen to our podcast have been hearing us talk about it for a while, and now I'd like to formally present our contributions. A few of Kong's more outspoken players helped put together a document with a long list of thoughts and ideas on balance for MWO, which was requested by Garth and submitted to him shortly thereafter. Will these fixes make it in-game? We don't know. However, I think it's worth sharing with the community to both help foster discussion and help gain support for certain ideas.

The initial letter to Garth with a summarized version of our thoughts can be found here, but it should be noted that this is just that - a summary. For the big picture, it's important to read our raw notes here, which show our individual thoughts on each issue - Kong, after all, is a conglomerate rather than a united entity, and thus we don't always see eye to eye on how we wanted things to turn out, but each system has its own pros and cons.

We welcome feedback on our ideas, as well as submissions of your own. If you have tweaks or other ideas on our balance concepts, post them here - after all, PGI is watching (or so they claim, at least).

I agree with almost all of it and have been talking about most of it since the issues really came up.

[Tezcatli]

I don't know if I really like the idea of different sized hard point system completely restricting weapon loadouts. What if instead slotting a PPC into a smaller sized energy point, it generates more heat or has a higher cooldown? Perhaps

I like the idea of Ultra ACs having a cone of fire and either no jam or way less jam.

I don't really wanna nit pick through the other stuff.

Edited by Tezcatli, 23 July 2013 - 02:45 PM.

[XANi]

The problem I have with hardpoint size system is that, while it "fixes" boating because you basically can't mount more than X of big weapons, it also reduces variety for med/light as they would basically be banned, or need specific variant (like HBK-4H) to mount any of the heavier weapons and I dont think running 2 PPC or 2 LL cicada is really a problem

Or it could be just "if mech does not have large slot, large weapon takes 2 normal slots". So assault with 6 energy slots (2 of which large) could put 4 PPCs only if he had 2 normal slots in same part of the mech (and mechs could be constructed so most of parts in assault would say have 1 large + 1 normal ) so to run 4 PPC players would have to pick very specific variant, while still allowing putting PPC in say jenner or hunchback arm

But with proposed heat change slot sizes are basically redundant because if heat cap would change to 30 for large mechs firing 4PPC would result in shutdown and getting heat damage, and firing 4 ER PPC would almost always cook you. I'm only worried that some stock mech build will be hurt and newbies will wonder why firing all lazers in their hunch hunch kills them. But then heat capacity could just be mech-specific

As for "power drain", this could be implemented as timed debuff to mech capabilities, say 2 PPC alpha would halve movement speed for few seconds 3 and its 1/4 speed and your heat dissipation gets reduces because cooling system didnt got enougth power, and 4 when your mech goes into shutdown.

Or just make heat scale gradual, when say at 50-70% you get slight bonus to dissipation (for being in "perfect" zone), and aboce mech starts to slow down, weapons take more time to recycle, heat disspiation gets worse and finally above 100% you get damage.

So good pilot would keep his mech in 50-70% range to get optimal heat dissipation, and too big alphas would be punised by either not being in "optimal" zone, or jumping heat above 70% and giving debuffs.

As for heat sinks, with reduced total heat capacity SHS could be changed to get a bit of extra capacity and DHS would just have dissipation, so if someone wants to alpha a bit more he would load SHS but be penalized with less dissipation and more tonnage

[Agent 0 Fortune]

I like the thought and effort put into this project. I have a differing opinion on a few items, listed below:

A Hardpoint Proposal:
Hardpoint sizes should directly correspond with actual hardpoint limitations…
Have large and normal size designations for all the weapons. The actual designation of what should be normal or large can be decided upon at a later date specifically for balance purposes.

Agent’s take:
While I think weapon boating is a problem in MWO, enforcing these hardpoint/critical slot restrictions isn’t a solution. It just means instead of having a variety of PPC boats, everyone is running an Awesome. And while Valk makes some good points regarding PGI promoting/demoting variants, it is almost impossible to get that cat back in the bag, for instance “Joe Moe” bought Atlas D-DC, paint, and camo with MC ($$$), and then built it as a sniper mech, now you are going arbitrarily force him into a brawler role?

I do think this idea has merit with regards to missile racks. LRM and SRM are two of the most boated weapons, and this issue is going to be compounded when Clan LRMs arrive with their lack of minimum range and dramatically reduced tonnage (fear the 6x cLRM20 catapult).

I also believe this issue can be addressed with a Trial Lobby, or limited modification Lobby (once Lobbies are introduced), where like-minded players can play by more restrictive (or primitive) rules.
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Alpha strikes
All heatsinks add a lot of heat threshold to the mech, so you can fire several alphas at once without a problem or drawback. AFAIK the threshold bonus should be completely removed and heatsinks only should offer heat dissipation (though lots more then now, truedubs etc...)

Agent’s take:
I really like this proposal, right up to the part about giving “specific” mechs a bonus heat threshold. I would much rather see a universally applied rule, like a fixed heat threshold, or a module/equipment than can increase the threshold.
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Ferro-Fibrous Armor
Increase the damage resistance of Ferro-Fibrous Armor in order to make it a more competitive choice for mechs versus Endo-Steel. You never use FF over Endo, ever.

Agent’s Take:
I disagree. Yes, no one takes FF instead of Endo, instead they take FF in addition to Endo. By improving Ferro-Fibrous armor to be equal to Endo-Steel, you are only benefiting a select group of mechs (mostly lights) that have the free critical slots to carry both. And framed as “do light mechs need a free tonnage buff” I have to say no.
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Individual Weapon Changes - Agent
LRMs – boating is way to easy and way too common. The heat scale does not work, since it is so easy and effective to chain fire them. The only way I see this being fixed is through Hardpoint/Missile Tube restrictions, and/or Ammo hardpoints.
Additionally I want to see where LRMs are coming from on my radar.

PPC & ER PPC– decrease projectile speed to 1000m/s would solve 99% of PPC boating and sniping problems.

LB10x – This weapon doesn’t seem functionally different than an SRM10 (SRM4 + SRM6) with artemis, but it weighs 11 tons, takes up 6 critical slots, and does half damage. Either the damage needs to doubled (at least) or just make into an AC10 (slug) with a bonus critical chance and shorter range.

ECM – scrap it and start fresh, it is completely broken. There are only 5 mechs that can use it out of 88 (5.7%), and yet it shows up on multiple mechs every match. PGI can’t even allow it on hero mechs because it would considered Pay-to-Win. It has forced the radical change and development for several other pieces of equipment, which have in turn broken other aspects of the game (TAG, NARC, BAP, Seismic, LRM, SSRM, PPC, UAV, Thermal Vision, etc).
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Matchmaking - Agent

• only 1 group per team, the rest is filled with PUGs. I have seen way too many instances of 2 groups being immediately put on the same team, then watching the other team slowly fill up with PUGs, and usually the PUG team has a much lower ELO and tonnage because the matchmaker is rushing the matchmaking for the premades.
  
• Group Elo. Premade groups need an Elo tax for purposes of finding an appropriate opponent. Using the average score is too beneficial to the premade team. Either set all members to the highest member or use average +25% (this is only for matchmaking, actual Elo movement is based on actual individual value).
  
• Weight class matching should be absolute (not a priority, if you can’t match weight class, you don’t get a match). We already know that Elo is weight class based, and thus invalid in comparing two pilots in different weight classes. Additionally if teams are of differing weight due to variance in weight class, then the lighter teams should receive a % bonus to C-Bill and XP based on the difference.
  
• Trial mechs. Ideally would only fight other trial mechs, but I realize that may be impossible due to limited opposing players. To help categorize trial mech users their ELO should be calculated at 75% of actual value (although ELO movement is based on actual value).
  
• Elo hard –caps. Calculated Elo values between all non premade group members of a match should be restricted to a specific range. Groups use the group Elo value (see above). This will help create balanced matches and prevent Elo Fixing.

[Monky]

Red squirrel, on 21 July 2013 - 02:07 AM, said:

Great suggestions Kong


I like this idea:
"[color=#000000]Make Pulse Lasers a “constant stream” weapon similar to MGs, with adjusted heat and damage values to make them a higher DPS weapon at the expense of range, heat, and weight"[/color]


You could also add a permantent toggle on/off for TAG to your list.

This idea would make pulse lasers as useful as machineguns. Pulse lasers are already underpowered, having to have 100% facetime with the target would only exacerbate the problem. It would be 'cool', but if you pumped the power up to compensate, they'd suddenly be insanely powerful in any situation where the enemy can't force you to turn away.

It's a no-go.

[Stingz]

Monky, on 23 July 2013 - 04:18 PM, said:

This idea would make pulse lasers as useful as machineguns. Pulse lasers are already underpowered, having to have 100% facetime with the target would only exacerbate the problem. It would be 'cool', but if you pumped the power up to compensate, they'd suddenly be insanely powerful in any situation where the enemy can't force you to turn away.

It's a no-go.

Many things have that effect, like AC/2, (U)AC/5 and LRMs also punish mechs in the open. MG Pulse lasers would amplify the strengths and weakness of regular lasers.

If that doesn't work, you could greatly reduce heat on Pulse lasers. They are heavy and short range, the extra heat is just unnecessary in MWO. Besides the extra heat is to justify the -2 to hit modifier (extra accuracy) on the Battletech TT.

[Mongoose Trueborn]

You guys love to over complicate everything.

If brawlers could move fast enough and have enough survivability to get on top of snipers, then out dps them, there wouldn't be a sniper balance alpha poptart ecm lrm cryfest on the forums anymore.

They only need to tweak relative speed and armor values.