231 replies to this topic

[Royalewithcheese]

"FPS balanced around a tabletop game."

[Protection]

Lack of creativity, testing, and experimentation with weapon characteristics and xml variables leading to stagnant, tedious, convoluted balancing programs that cause more issues than they solve, taking away from depth and strategy.

[nitra]

one word. convergence.

[GalaxyBluestar]

Protection, on 12 September 2013 - 07:32 PM, said:

Lack of creativity, testing, and experimentation with weapon characteristics and xml variables leading to stagnant, tedious, convoluted balancing programs that cause more issues than they solve, taking away from depth and strategy.

for core weapons and equipment balance i agree with this. the beta time was squandered with stubburness and glacial implementation until what do ya know ppc gets it's heat up and speed cut anyways. sorta proves ghostheat to be pointless by implementation admission. still it's nice the devs did listen to what people said for months on end, shame they let the meta carryon for months on end and... whoops beta shield's gone!

[Dimento Graven]

lockwoodx, on 12 September 2013 - 04:11 PM, said:

My apologies you cannot tolerate the opinion of another poster, let alone come across as mature.

I think you need to reread your post, even if that's just an 'opinion', wow man... Just... Wow...

[Dimento Graven]

Kaijin, on 12 September 2013 - 06:32 PM, said:

TT is Solaris, basically. As MWO has promised with Community Warfare to be much bigger than just arena combat on the game world - Companies of mechs going at each other for territory control, that falls to the lore or the novels and Mechwarrior, in which custom deviations from stock mechs in the militaries of the Inner Sphere were extremely rare...

Not sure where you get this idea considering in lore... My understanding is that a significant number of IS 'mechs, perhaps even verging on a majority, are family heirlooms, or 'mechs captured/salvaged from other battles, potentially hundreds of years old. The original Star League era and other better technologies originally installed in all those 'mechs were randomly replaced with whatever was available.

Only the more recently manufactured 'mechs had any standardization at all, and typically after the first battle, were 'uniqued' from whatever was available in stores or from salvage.

Ultimately lore has non-standard custom 'mechs being the norm of the IS. Clans had standardized modular builds where weapon systems could be quickly swapped.

[Kaijin]

Dimento Graven, on 12 September 2013 - 08:24 PM, said:

Not sure where you get this idea considering in lore... My understanding is that a significant number of IS 'mechs, perhaps even verging on a majority, are family heirlooms, or 'mechs captured/salvaged from other battles, potentially hundreds of years old. The original Star League era and other better technologies originally installed in all those 'mechs were randomly replaced with whatever was available.

Only the more recently manufactured 'mechs had any standardization at all, and typically after the first battle, were 'uniqued' from whatever was available in stores or from salvage.

Ultimately lore has non-standard custom 'mechs being the norm of the IS. Clans had standardized modular builds where weapon systems could be quickly swapped.

Prior to the end of the Fourth Succession War (3028-3030), which is history, as far as we're concerned in MWO..

Quoting the relevant text from Sarna:
"With the creation of the first BattleMech in the 25th Century the face of battle in the Inner Sphere changed. In the centuries that followed these awesome machines and the men and women that piloted them came to be viewed as the modern incarnation of the Knight-Errant. These masters of the modern battlefield were given honors, and some were even raised to the nobility on the merit of their accomplishments. Over time a social class of MechWarriors formed and a series of traditions became established. During the long years of the Succession Wars, as the Great Houses battled each other for control of the Inner Sphere, many MechWarriors owned their own BattleMechs and a tradition of passing the 'Mech and their responsibilities from one generation to the next within a family line started. These 'Mechs became a treasured resource for those lucky enough to have them and were coveted and repaired again and again over the centuries.

This changed with the end of the Fourth Succession War. With the discovery, development and rapid adoption of many new and old technologies, the ancient 'Mechs that had held the field for so many years became hopelessly outclassed by newer generations of BattleMechs leaving factory lines throughout the Inner Sphere. The average independent MechWarrior could not keep up with the House-sponsored armies in keeping their systems and components up to date and soon fell hopelessly behind. With the coming of the Clans this became even more evident. The change in culture has had grave consequences for the private ownership of BattleMechs. Most of the newer Inner Sphere produced 'Mechs are owned by the various House Militaries, while amongst the Clans all property is owned by the Clan itself and a Clan MechWarrior never owns his own equipment."

Emphasis mine. That endosteel. Those DHS. The ER weapons. XL Engines. That's House Military issue.

Besides which, even when replacing one weapon with another that fits, how often do you think that was an AC20 replacing a machine gun? That sort of thing required extensive structural changes. Swapping out fusion engines? Hardly. Repairing them, or taking apart the mech for scrap if the engine couldn't be fixed. The stuff we can do to customize our mechs would require something more than the workshop on a union-class dropship.

[ShinVector]

Hit state rewind is still broken and you don't know where you need to shoot to get a good hit.

[and zero]

PGI has no idea how to balance a game...

[Alistair Winter]

I've compiled a rough count of the input so far, but not included vague replies or stuff that otherwise didn't follow the rules in the OP. Of course, this doesn't convey all the little nuances, but it gives you an idea of the response.

Comments by other people so far:
Flawed heat system: IIIII IIII
Pinpoint aiming / convergence: IIIII III
Poor matchmaking (rookies vs veterans): IIIII I
Mechs dying too quickly / too big center torsos: IIII
A certain few mechs and builds are far better than others: IIII
Gameplay isn't balanced for high level competitive play, only low level play: III
Poor ECM implementation: IIII
Hardpoint system: III
Lack of information warfare: III
Macros: III
Not enough size difference between light, medium, heavy and assault mechs: III
Poor Hit registration: II
Lack of tonnage restriction: II
No integrated teamspeak: I
Lack of variety and counters in weaponry: I
Too much FPS and not enough sim: I
Lack of collisions, collision damage or death from above: I
Too much alpha-striking: I
Lack of tutorials / rookie training: I
Inconsistent experience and mechanics: I
Disconnects: I

[ryoma]

You should edit that tally into the OP post.

Also send this thread to all the PGI employees through PM.

[HRR Insanity]

MWO's gameplay balance issues have two factors: 1) Pinpoint convergence and the resulting effects on 'Mech survivability 2) PGI's inability to understand #1 and their resulting cascade of completely useless weapon/game balance changes over the last year.

In short, PGI is bad at game design and balancing.

Alistair Winter, on 12 September 2013 - 11:34 PM, said:

I've compiled a rough count of the input so far, but not included vague replies or stuff that otherwise didn't follow the rules in the OP. Of course, this doesn't convey all the little nuances, but it gives you an idea of the response.

Comments by other people so far:
Flawed heat system: IIIII IIII
Pinpoint aiming / convergence: IIIII III
Poor matchmaking (rookies vs veterans): IIIII I
Mechs dying too quickly / too big center torsos: IIII
A certain few mechs and builds are far better than others: IIII
Gameplay isn't balanced for high level competitive play, only low level play: III
Poor ECM implementation: IIII
Hardpoint system: III
Lack of information warfare: III
Macros: III
Not enough size difference between light, medium, heavy and assault mechs: III
Poor Hit registration: II
Lack of tonnage restriction: II
No integrated teamspeak: I
Lack of variety and counters in weaponry: I
Too much FPS and not enough sim: I
Lack of collisions, collision damage or death from above: I
Too much alpha-striking: I
Lack of tutorials / rookie training: I
Inconsistent experience and mechanics: I
Disconnects: I

All the things in bold are caused by pinpoint convergence.

[AnarchyBurger]

Overcomplicated, but at the same time too simple.

[Alistair Winter]

HRR Insanity, on 13 September 2013 - 12:54 AM, said:

All the things in bold are caused by pinpoint convergence.

Your opinion is noted, but I will keep the list as it is, as everyone may not agree with you. For example, some people want to keep convergence as it is, and just adjust the damage, armour or internal structure.

And in regards to some mechs being better than others, that is definitely not just caused by pinpoint convergence. I don't care if you're firing your guns in two completely opposite directions, both of them will still hit my Awesome 8Q straight in the center torso.

[Jam the Bam]

Attempting to link an active computer game to an out dated tabletop game. Never going to work. And the people that keep saying 'if it just worked more like TT it would be awesome', what a load of rubbish.

My main problem just now is the lack of private lobbies. Cannot wait to set up a match properly, with weight limits.

[Cybermech]

"Explain the current biggest problem(s) for MWO gameplay balance in one sentence"
People copying others ideas and don't fully understand them, havoc to the forums and nearly impossible to get good feedback.

[Eric Harvester]

I have no idea what a lot of the things being discussed here are, ELO, Convergance (i can guess), but my biggest problem is the mech sizes, Lights being the main culprits. In Battletech mechs range from 8 to 12 meters in height which means from the tallest to the smallest is only a 33% difference and the lights are way smaller than that compared to say the atlas.

One of the tooltips you get greeted with while waiting to drop is a scout shouldn't go against an assault head on, yet in almost every battle i have seen they do and win more often than not. If this is the way people want it, then the price of the light mech should go up, because at the moment in the MWO universe why would anyone want to ride or buy any mech bigger than a light or medium since you could buy 2 or 3 lights for the price of a heavy or assault and you would have a better chance of winning.

I am seriously considering not playing MWO anymore because of the inconsistancy of gameplay and the imbalance, as i see it, of the light mech compared to the other weight classes. I understand that this is a beta and that things are still being worked out, but to my mind this game isn't even close to Battletech or Mechwarrior and is little more than a gaint robot fps, at which point it is entertaining but not for me.

[D A T A]

1) not fps balanced and ping balanced

2) they completely nullified the roles, to many mech builds have the same output, so they are all equal...... ENHANCHE SPECIFIC FEATURES OF SPECIFIC WEAPONS TO SOLVE THIS

[Alistair Winter]

I'm assuming you're new to the game, Eric Harvester. In which case, welcome!

Eric Harvester, on 13 September 2013 - 01:50 AM, said:

I have no idea what a lot of the things being discussed here are, ELO, Convergance (i can guess)

ELO is a ranking system based on performance
Convergence is the ability to aim guns in different limbs and components at the same spot on your target.

Eric Harvester, on 13 September 2013 - 01:50 AM, said:

but my biggest problem is the mech sizes, Lights being the main culprits. In Battletech mechs range from 8 to 12 meters in height which means from the tallest to the smallest is only a 33% difference and the lights are way smaller than that compared to say the atlas.

Well, sometimes medium mechs in MWO are as tall as assault mechs...

Anyway, in Battletech, a team of 6 light mechs and 6 medium mechs would never go up against 6 heavy mechs and 6 assault mechs and expect to win. In MWO, a match-up like that can happen quite regularly. It's not necessarily bad, it just means you have to redesign the core principles in the game. Either match the teams by tonnage, battle value or something similar, or make sure that every mech is equal so you don't have to worry about what kind of mech people choose.

The problem is that MWO went halfway. They made a compromise that doesn't work. In MWO, every mech is equal, but some mechs are more equal than others.

Eric Harvester, on 13 September 2013 - 01:50 AM, said:

One of the tooltips you get greeted with while waiting to drop is a scout shouldn't go against an assault head on, yet in almost every battle i have seen they do and win more often than not. If this is the way people want it, then the price of the light mech should go up, because at the moment in the MWO universe why would anyone want to ride or buy any mech bigger than a light or medium since you could buy 2 or 3 lights for the price of a heavy or assault and you would have a better chance of winning.

In a 1:1 duel, the assault mech beats the light mech 9 times out of 10, assuming the pilots are equally skilled. And as you play the game for a while, and you have tens of millions of C-bills you don't know what to do with, the question isn't "Why should the Atlas cost 13 million C-bills", the question is "Why should I still use my Jenner?"

And if people can't answer that question, you'll see 12 Atlai on all teams in the end. Especially now that PGI is trying to make matchmaking more strict, so experienced players don't get matched up with new players. Right now, almost half of the light mechs out there seem to belong to relatively inexperienced players, some of whom don't even have enough money to buy a better engine for their Raven.

So in short - unless PGI implements some kind of tonnage restriction, we'll forget that light mechs and medium mechs ever existed pretty soon.

Eric Harvester, on 13 September 2013 - 01:50 AM, said:

I am seriously considering not playing MWO anymore because of the inconsistancy of gameplay and the imbalance, as i see it, of the light mech compared to the other weight classes. I understand that this is a beta and that things are still being worked out, but to my mind this game isn't even close to Battletech or Mechwarrior and is little more than a gaint robot fps, at which point it is entertaining but not for me.

This is a fairly common statement among new players, but I assure you, the roles will be flipped if you keep playing. You seem to want the light mechs to be the least dangerous mechs in the game, and this is actually also PGI's goal - because they make more money selling heavy and assault mechs for real money. It's bad for business when the cheapest mechs are the best mechs.

I'm not going to say that you will end up loving the game - who knows if you will. But as you keep playing, I think you'll change your view of the big issues.

[HRR Insanity]

Alistair Winter, on 13 September 2013 - 01:06 AM, said:

Your opinion is noted, but I will keep the list as it is, as everyone may not agree with you. For example, some people want to keep convergence as it is, and just adjust the damage, armour or internal structure.

And in regards to some mechs being better than others, that is definitely not just caused by pinpoint convergence. I don't care if you're firing your guns in two completely opposite directions, both of them will still hit my Awesome 8Q straight in the center torso.

/shrugs/ The 'best' 'Mechs will always be those that have the optimal combination of 'Mech geometry and ability to maximize their alphastrike.

If you resolve pinpoint convergence in a sane fashion, 'Mechs will still be differentiated by their relative geometric imbalances, but those imbalances are substantially more difficult to exploit.