29 replies to this topic

[Braggart]

The first step in fixing medium mechs is fixing armor. The doubled armor was a huge mistake. All mechs should have simply been given a flat even increase in armor. Possibly by class of mech.

Heavy and assault mechs benefit from that doubled armor far to much.

Figure if all mechs had 25 base armor, then add in their normal amount on top.

The results would be as such.

Raven before fix 44, after 47
Hunchback before fix 64 after fix 57
Cataphract before fix 88 before, after 69
atlas before fix 124, after 87.

Doubled armor broke the balance of this game. Creating mechs that are so incredibly durable, that the time to kill on them for smaller mechs is absurd. Doubling the armor of a 50 ton mech does little to increase the time to kill, but doubling the armor of an assault is a huge increase to survivability.

Doubled armor was a heavy handed and not well thought out bandaid that has turned the game into what we see today.

Think about it. Pretend a Medium takes 10 seconds to kill an assault, and it takes an assault 5 seconds to kill a medium. PGI decides to double the armor to prolong life. The problem being that it now takes 20 seconds to kill a heavy, and 10 for an assault. A flat change to armor should have made it 10 seconds to kill Medium, and 15 to kill the assault.

a well piloted medium would have every chance against heavier mechs if the armor values on those mechs was at a reasonable level, which currently they are not. The assault mechs have far to much armor and it allows them to weather an assault that should scare them.

Another way this helps balance things is that we have 50 ton medium mechs are large as heavy mechs, and and heavy mechs as large as assault mechs. Now that the overall gap in total armor has been shortened. Such as the quickdraw having 65 armor, and the highlander having 83. That is totally an amount of armor that someone in a QD can overcome, while the guy in the highlander has the advantage in more weapons and armor, but both mechs are roughly the same size.

Edited by Braggart, 29 July 2013 - 12:56 PM.

[Vassago Rain]

Is that why my atlas last a grand total of 10 seconds in a fight against someone with actual firepower?

[WhiteRabbit]

uhm

Braggart, on 29 July 2013 - 12:40 PM, said:

The first step in fixing medium mechs is fixing armor. The doubled armor was a huge mistake. All mechs should have simply been given a flat even increase in armor. Possibly by class of mech.

Heavy and assault mechs benefit from that doubled armor far to much.

Figure if all mechs had 25 base armor, then add in their normal amount on top.

The results would be as such.

Raven before fix 44, after 47
Hunchback before fix 64 after fix 57
Cataphract before fix 88 before, after 69
atlas before fix 124, after 87.

Doubled armor broke the balance of this game. Creating mechs that are so incredibly durable, that the time to kill on them for smaller mechs is absurd. Doubling the armor of a 50 ton mech does little to increase the time to kill, but doubling the armor of an assault is a huge increase to survivability.

Doubled armor was a heavy handed and not well thought out bandaid that has turned the game into what we see today.

Think about it. Pretend a Medium takes 10 seconds to kill an assault, and it takes an assault 5 seconds to kill a medium. PGI decides to double the armor to prolong life. The problem being that it now takes 20 seconds to kill a heavy, and 10 for an assault. A flat change to armor should have made it 10 seconds to kill Medium, and 15 to kill the assault.

a well piloted medium would have every chance against heavier mechs if the armor values on those mechs was at a reasonable level, which currently they are not. The assault mechs have far to much armor and it allows them to weather an assault that should scare them.

uhm...raven 47 and hunch 57...how in the world would that help meds? they'd be even less usefull then they are now.
A mech that has a top speed (tweaked) of 92ish (and has a bunch of ohter drawbacks) with only 10 more armor than a mech that has a top speed of 150ish ... come on how's that fair?

Actually that idea really buffs lights and kills meds.

[Joseph Mallan]

There are several things that contributed to breaking the balance of this game.
double armor was only one of them. On TT a Medium was not a match for an assault, unless the assault was a scrub build like a Charger. After all, most Assaults carry twice the armor and the weapons of a Medium. So unless the pilot had a much better gunnery Pilot skill, a medium was crushed by an assault. You are trying to make the Average something it's not. Really good.

[Braggart]

Joseph Mallan, on 29 July 2013 - 01:02 PM, said:

There are several things that contributed to breaking the balance of this game.
double armor was only one of them. On TT a Medium was not a match for an assault, unless the assault was a scrub build like a Charger. After all, most Assaults carry twice the armor and the weapons of a Medium. So unless the pilot had a much better gunnery Pilot skill, a medium was crushed by an assault. You are trying to make the Average something it's not. Really good.

Actually, im still trying to make mediums average. The assault mechs still carry more weapons, and more armor. Just like tabletop. Even after this change, equally skilled opponents will still dominate a medium when they are in an assault. A medium in TT was quite capable of inflicting lots of damage on an assault.

The double armor was a rich get richer fix that is causing the current meta of go big or go home. If heavies and assaults had a reasonable armor value, people would see the advantages of speed, but the fact is that the ability to absorb damage and return that damage is far far more valuable. Something fixed by reducing their armor.

WhiteRabbit, on 29 July 2013 - 01:01 PM, said:

uhm


uhm...raven 47 and hunch 57...how in the world would that help meds? they'd be even less usefull then they are now.
A mech that has a top speed (tweaked) of 92ish (and has a bunch of ohter drawbacks) with only 10 more armor than a mech that has a top speed of 150ish ... come on how's that fair?

Actually that idea really buffs lights and kills meds.

as hit detection continues to improve, Lights will drop like flies. Lights will need this change as much as mediums as hit detection improves.


Sadly, as long as heavies and assault sport as much armor as they currently do. Mediums will always be terrible, regardless of mobility buffs and quirks. The fact is that the heavier mechs have what really counts, armor, and weapons.

Edited by Braggart, 29 July 2013 - 01:11 PM.

[WhiteRabbit]

Braggart, on 29 July 2013 - 01:07 PM, said:

SNIP

as hit detection continues to improve, Lights will drop like flies. Lights will need this change as much as mediums as hit detection improves.

don't get me wrong, i'm all for buffing lights and meds. Nevertheless in classes where speed is more valuable than armor (or at least 'buffs' the armor) i think that 10 more (=2 medlas) with a speed-defecit of nearly 60 would really screw meds over.

Edit: the real problem for meds right now is that they are not fast enough for their armor. But if you buff the meds' speed lights become less usefull...actually now that i think about it slowing down heavies and assaults would make meds way more usefull than they are now, without taking the roll from lights.

Edited by WhiteRabbit, 29 July 2013 - 01:15 PM.

[GingerBang]

Or, half the values back to normal and get rid of convergence so one single part doesn't just explode when 60 damage hits the tip of a needle.


Problem solved, MWO is fun again.

[Deathlike]

I thought this thread was going to have the epic response of having medium mechs "lose weight" aka reducing their hitboxes.

Instead, I got a random/arbitrary solution that doesn't solve what it intends to solve.

[Murzao]

Dunno bout you but I was getting 700+ damage 2/3/4 kill games yesterday in a regular fashion in my mediums. Just shave off some back armor pad it front side and you have the same armor amount as an assault mech. If you run fast you won't get shot in the back so. That is how to make mediums tankier than slow moving assaults as going 90+ a lot of people will miss you if you don't be dumb and walk in straight lines/same speed. Nothing to see here really move along......but uuuuh yea make me even more OP please:)


" Even after this change, equally skilled opponents will still dominate a medium when they are in an assault" Ummm not a chance, medium chassis when played right is superior to the assault....by your logic I guess this means I must be the best player ever at this game considering I can whip any assault in a 1v1 fight in my mediums when I choose the battlefield and since I go faster than them...I always do. Because by your logic if they were equal to me they'd kill me 1v1....they never do.

Edited by Murzao, 29 July 2013 - 01:25 PM.

[Sable Dove]

Actually, because they're so much larger, and thus, cored much more easily, heavies and assaults benefit least from the doubled armour, while lights, being small enough to reliably spread damage, benefit most.

The problem is that Mediums are too big. Pretty much the size of heavy mechs, but without the armour, meaning they're large enough to reliably target specific components, but they lack the armour to deal with this (poorly-implemented) mechanic.

The instant, pin-point convergence, and extremely-easy aiming that makes it trivial to bypass 60% of a mech's armour is what needs to change. Anything larger than a Cicada is wasting armour on the arms, legs, and often the side torsos, because everyone shoots for CT, and it's easy to hit the CT regularly.

Mediums benefit the same amount, if not (proportionally) more than heavies and assaults from doubled armour. They're just plain too big, and aren't given the armour to compensate for their size.

[Joseph Mallan]

Braggart, on 29 July 2013 - 01:07 PM, said:

Actually, im still trying to make mediums average. The assault mechs still carry more weapons, and more armor. Just like tabletop. Even after this change, equally skilled opponents will still dominate a medium when they are in an assault. A medium in TT was quite capable of inflicting lots of damage on an assault.

The double armor was a rich get richer fix that is causing the current meta of go big or go home. If heavies and assaults had a reasonable armor value, people would see the advantages of speed, but the fact is that the ability to absorb damage and return that damage is far far more valuable. Something fixed by reducing their armor.

I never noticed this in my 28 Years playing TT. Unless it was a AC20 toting Medium, I never feared or worried about the outcome of fighting a Medium in an Assault.

[Steel Claws]

I got a better idea - how about we stop trying to fix stuff that isn't broke and concentrate on the stuff that is broken.

Speaking as a medium mech pilot - there is nothing wrong with them. If you try to go head to head with an assault with no concern for tactics - you will die - and you should die. You have to be smart about it. Hit them from the back and flanks while avoiding them head on. If you don't know how to do this you have no business piloting one. Good medium pilots take down assaults all the time one on one or even one on two.

I see many mediums in game and they are usually some of the last mechs to die and score very well if well driven. As further evidence that mediums are OK I would point out that in the assaults vs the world tourney mediums scored as high as half of the assaults and actually surpased the Awesomes.

Edited by Steel Claws, 29 July 2013 - 01:38 PM.

[DaZur]

Just so I have this clear in my head... You want to actually armor-nerf Assaults and Heavies to make them more like Mediums in an effort to provide a balanced playing field?

Sorry OP but that's all kinds of crazy...

While I appreciate you wish the re-invigorate Mediums, there is a whole meta that is not fully realized yet until CW enters the picture that kinda requires the de facto weight classes and the roles they represent.

Your premise is logical if there was no greater plan and their was no applied logic behind the weight classes and this was nothing more than a shooter... The reality is, while it's not germaine now, eventually the weight classes will mean something other than a subjective size / armour disparity.

Edited by DaZur, 29 July 2013 - 01:27 PM.

[xCico]

No, the first step is fixing HSR, because this is first person SHOOTER game, right? After that evrything else…

[GODzillaGSPB]

Under a bit of focused fire, assault mechs fall so quickly. On it's own I don't think your suggestion will help. It will nerf asaults into the ground. They're too slow, too good of a target.

Hand in hand with weapon balancing...it might work. But looking at the figures I'd predict that 99% will run lights because they get the best of it. ^^

[Nryrony]

There is only one way, - make mediums light hunters.

And at the same time rework the whole speed turning rate system.

As I stated before,

light beats assault, is on pair with heavys and gets killed by mediums
medium beats light, is on pair with assault and gets killed by heavys

work out the rest, its a pretty fair system and the balancing tool would be the mech speed and its turning values, for the mech itself and its torso/arms.

In a nutshell, make the big mechs slower and the light ones faster, so that even average players don't have trouble to kill their dedicate target.

In addition it might help the game if everyone could withstand more dmg, it would allow for more tactical play.

[Thorqemada]

There is everything wrong with Mediums - they have no niche to occupy.

Edited by Thorqemada, 29 July 2013 - 01:55 PM.

[Braggart]

DaZur, on 29 July 2013 - 01:26 PM, said:

Just so I have this clear in my head... You want to actually armor-nerf Assaults and Heavies to make them more like Mediums in an effort to provide a balanced playing field?

Sorry OP but that's all kinds of crazy...

While I appreciate you wish the re-invigorate Mediums, there is a whole meta that is not fully realized yet until CW enters the picture that kinda requires the de facto weight classes and the roles they represent.

Your premise is logical if there was no greater plan and their was no applied logic behind the weight classes and this was nothing more than a shooter... The reality is, while it's not germaine now, eventually the weight classes will mean something other than a subjective size / armour disparity.

actually no. I actually want to maintain balance.

PGI wanted fights to last longer, so they blindly doubled all armor for all mechs in this game. Without thinking about what that does to balance. Because mechs have different values for armor, some game more than others, such as assaults, doubled armor results in a much larger gain.

A flat increase to every mechs total armor would have increased the time to kill, without giving an advantage to any class of mech. Unlike the doubling of all armor where a 50 ton mech got 32 points, while an assault got 62 armor. Heavies and assaults already had the advantage of firepower, armor, and internal structure. Because armor was doubled, that advantage was increased even further,

This change does not make a medium mech able to beat an assault(IF both players are equally skilled), but it does put mediums,heavies, and assault in the same ballpark.


It was a heavy handed bandaid that has absolutely ruined any kind of balance between weight classes.

Edited by Braggart, 29 July 2013 - 01:59 PM.

[Steel Claws]

Thorqemada, on 29 July 2013 - 01:54 PM, said:

There is everything wrong with Mediums - they have no niche to occupy.

If someone has no imagination and tactical savy - that comment might even be true. They are the base defender/light killer/flanking harassing mech and are great used as this. If you try to use them like most people do - as an assault mech - you won't be successful. Mediums are the work horse of the lances.

[Hellcat420]

mediums are fine. the problem is idiots piloting mediums like they are assault mechs then crying becuase they get torn to shreds. i cant even count the amount of times i have seen medium mechs standing still trying to trade shots with multiple assault and heavy mechs, then cry about "broken mediums" when they die.

Edited by Hellcat420, 29 July 2013 - 02:14 PM.