1978 replies to this topic

[Taemien]

Cornmiser, did you read what they said they intend to do with Clan tech?

[Semper Fi]

Thank you for the info.
I understand that this is not all its going to be, and just some examples of ideas you are tossing around.
The game is progressing slowly, but still progressing in my opinion, and for some folks complaining is a way of life, even if some complaints are valid or invalid.

As far as clan Tech, the integration will be interesting without more options with matchmaking and clear understandings of those matchups. Which I am sure you will get out there the further this progresses.

Very tricky this tightrope you walk.
You have the Core of your players are very interested on the interplay and how well it lines up to lore and TT, and then those that have no idea what lore is for this game never knew there was a TT, but love to run around in giant robot tanks and kill things. These people are the hardest to reach and maintain I think in regards to a business model. But still have to allow for new blood and what not, because you probably cannot keep all your Core players happy anyway no matter what you do. (Can please some people some of the time but cannot please all of them all of the time kind of thing)

However to help with the Core players, some thoughts from me, which you have probably already had, but ehh, Its the Forums, anybody with a computer that can or cannot run the game, or are bored can post too.

I would think that you would do some "Clan" slices in the queues, where only clans can drop together on the same side. Which should probably only be 2 lances or 10 total mechs to keep with Lore to a degree. Only Clan mechs and clanners will drop in here against IS. Of course keeping in mind that Clan's have internal issues as well, and may need to drop against each other.

Then I would think IS folks will get their 12 mans, and only be paired up in basic drops with IS lone wolves or other affiliated IS groups. (Steiner/Davion/Kurita/Mercs) with the only affiliation with each other is being IS. No bonuses and what not because its not a crucial thing just grind. This group could drop against each other, or against clans. (Team DM as it is today.Only Cbills, and XP/MXP). However this makes the pool of people smaller, but keeps with the Lore to a degree.

Next would be overall CW. And how would that look. Well, this is tricky, but would require more slicing of player pools.
The below thoughts are not taking into account "missions/contracts" that at least I Hope come along soon.
Affiliated Steiner players/mercs could drop with Davions, until some timeframe for Civil War comes along.
But all other houses would need their separate queues, to be populated by non-affiliated Lone Wolves, or folks that don't care what house as long as they are paid in salvage and cbills.
The Salvage part allows IS and Clan folks to gain access to Clan builds/weapons or vice versa that they can play with no matter what they affiliated too. Which this would be a queue that might eventually go away, who knows.

Or, as indicated all IS fight as one side, and bringing loyalty to their associated houses. Keeps the player pool bigger, but takes away from lore to a degree.
So House Kurita and Davion can fight on the same side, against Clanners but not against other IS.
Some combination of the above to allow for Lore and reality of player base actually is tricky.

Then there is the community aspect, competitions, and other flavors of multi-player games that can be sliced up by the player base.
I have been impressed with the imagination of the player base and how it gets around the games current limitations.
To bad not everyone can see using their imaginations for the betterment of everyone in this game, but instead wish it to be served up, like a Movie, which they would probably complain about anyway.

There are to many "This is the right way"'s out there, and even if you as PGI get the perfect and no other way to do it, and keep it fun way, there will be those that say this is not right, and complain anyway. Even I might if it goes horribly wrong from what I have in my head. But that's the key, what's in my head, may not be right for the game, or overall player base. PGI your in a tough spot, I do not envy this tight rope you are on.

So I offer the above, as that is in line with ideas in my head, and hope PGI, keeps that in mind if possible. If not, then I can choose to be disappointed and quit or continue to play and kick butt, or get butt kicked. My choice, free market and all that jazz.

I love the fact yall have/are taking on this great challenge of Battletech/Mechwarrior, and have given us limited but a beautiful game that is growing, and not stagnant. Even if growth is not as fast as I would like it, it is still growing.

Keep up the work, and keep us informed. Read these forums, maybe get some ideas and implement them as you have done in the past, and keep growing. I hope the game will start growing faster now, but I will keep playing until you make it to a point that I don't want to play or am terribly bored of the game and grind. As I have done with other past but beloved games.

Semper FI.

[WarHippy]

Victor Morson, on 29 December 2013 - 12:55 PM, said:

Clan tech is going to be massively OP, yeah.

The problem is they take a weapon like the LRM/20 and go "Oh it's much better than the IS version, let's nerf it." So they nerf it to being only SERIOUSLY better than the IS weapon instead of HOLY **** better, and think that this solves anything?

Such a mess.

i.e. taking a 5 ton gun with no minimum range (LRM/20) and making it a 7 ton gun with SOME minimum range still makes it far better than a 10 ton gun with a huge minimum range no matter how you slice it.

I'm not sure what you are so worried about. The IS mechs are all in general going to be better armored and faster than the Clan mechs. With all the talk of increased heat and what will probably end up being an even more restrictive ghost heat system I highly doubt the Clan mechs are even going be able to make good use of the extra firepower. Add in rice paper armor and slower speeds the Clan mechs will melt faster than you can say its like shooting fish in a barrel. With the current plans I see no reason to pilot almost all of the announced Clan mechs other than for the sake of nostalgia, nor do I see how they can justify the the inflated c-bill prices of Clan mechs that at best look to be on an even playing field if not actually worse in some cases when compared to IS mechs.

[magji]

why this information is indeed something to think over, I agree with quite a few of the previous posts, this seems like you are rushing to get everything on the table and leaving the bugs and issues in the dust where they will just get compounded with all the new content being dumped on us.

[Koshirou]

WarHippy, on 30 December 2013 - 12:15 PM, said:

The IS mechs are all in general going to be better armored and faster than the Clan mechs.

Nope.

[WarHippy]

Koshirou, on 30 December 2013 - 01:50 PM, said:

Nope.

Care to elaborate, or are you just arguing for the sake of arguing?

[Koshirou]

Dire Wolf, Timber Wolf, Warhawk, Stormcrow, Adder all have maximum or near-maximum armor. So no, IS Mechs are not going to be better armored.

All of them, except the Dire Wolf and the Adder, are also faster than most or all IS Mechs of equivalent weight can be with maxed out engines. And the Dire Wolf's 300 Engine is not going to be a substantial disadvantage, tbh.

Clan lights are shafted, yeah, because they do not mount the very powerful engines that lights usually have in MWO. But heavier Clan Mechs are not disadvantaged in this regard.

[WarHippy]

Koshirou, on 30 December 2013 - 02:38 PM, said:

Dire Wolf, Timber Wolf, Warhawk, Stormcrow, Adder all have maximum or near-maximum armor. So no, IS Mechs are not going to be better armored.

All of them, except the Dire Wolf and the Adder, are also faster than most or all IS Mechs of equivalent weight can be with maxed out engines. And the Dire Wolf's 300 Engine is not going to be a substantial disadvantage, tbh.

Clan lights are shafted, yeah, because they do not mount the very powerful engines that lights usually have in MWO. But heavier Clan Mechs are not disadvantaged in this regard.

To be fair I said in general, and I implied that some would be better off than others.
The Dire Wolf and Stormcrow will probably be fine as will the Timber Wolf and Warhawk depending on how they handle hit boxes on the Timber Wolf and heat on the Warhawk(for that matter the Dire Wolf and Stormcrow may need to have their proverbial fingers crossed in that regard as well). All of the others are way under on the armor/engine or both. Not exactly a strong showing.

Edited by WarHippy, 30 December 2013 - 02:50 PM.

[Alexandrix]

Koshirou, on 30 December 2013 - 02:38 PM, said:

Dire Wolf, Timber Wolf, Warhawk, Stormcrow, Adder all have maximum or near-maximum armor. So no, IS Mechs are not going to be better armored.

All of them, except the Dire Wolf and the Adder, are also faster than most or all IS Mechs of equivalent weight can be with maxed out engines. And the Dire Wolf's 300 Engine is not going to be a substantial disadvantage, tbh.

Clan lights are shafted, yeah, because they do not mount the very powerful engines that lights usually have in MWO. But heavier Clan Mechs are not disadvantaged in this regard.

What's the spread on that armor? max armor won't mean much if half of it is wasted on rear armor.

[Sandtiger]

Taemien, on 26 December 2013 - 08:53 PM, said:

If I wanted MWO to be like MWLL, I'd say make mechs Stock only. Thats the difference between the two other than adding Tanks and AeroSpace. They run the same engine (and have the same netcode issues ironically enough) as well as a couple of other things.

Point is, Clan weapons being balanced to IS has worked, can be done well, and players do enjoy it. Thats a hard fact many in this thread refuse to admit.

But again, I think its simply because its something to complain about.

Lies slander and calumny! I played MMLL so if you want to go there we can. =] Clan weapons being balanced to IS has NOT worked, and was NOT done well, and to my knowledge NO player enjoyed it. That could be why many people in this thread have a problem with your hard lie. It is not a fact, and never will be. I am Inner Sphere for LIFE!!!! However, you cannot dumb down the clan technology or they won't be the clans. Their equipment was far superior! get used to that FACT, stop crying, and learn to shoot, and pilot your mech better. That is how you solve this problem. Toss balance right out the window.

[Taemien]

Sandtiger, on 30 December 2013 - 06:47 PM, said:

Lies slander and calumny! I played MMLL so if you want to go there we can. =] Clan weapons being balanced to IS has NOT worked, and was NOT done well, and to my knowledge NO player enjoyed it. That could be why many people in this thread have a problem with your hard lie. It is not a fact, and never will be. I am Inner Sphere for LIFE!!!! However, you cannot dumb down the clan technology or they won't be the clans. Their equipment was far superior! get used to that FACT, stop crying, and learn to shoot, and pilot your mech better. That is how you solve this problem. Toss balance right out the window.

You want to cite your information that it didn't work?

I can start by posting numbers that support my position if you'd like.

[Kursam]

I think it would be interesting if:

The Clan-Mech´s manage their speed by the energy supply (meaning: Ballistic weapon´s make the Mech fast, Energy weapon make the Mech slow, Missiles are medium).

The different type of Clan-Mech are delimited by the Engine type & rate.

Torso twist & Arm flexibility by the Hardpoints (meaning: Ballistic weapon´s less flexibility, Missiles most flexibility, Energy are medium).

Trying to but the Fractions & Clan´s, together & against in the right groups will take a loooong time.


And as a pilot i take the Mech that´s the best for my playstyle no matter the cost.
What ends up in IS-Mech & Clan-Mech mixed up in my Mechlab, meaning too Clantech in IS-Mech & IS-tech in Clan-Mech (somehow logic Clantech is based on the IS-tech).

Otherwise i have to make a different Account.

[Kaio Pryde]

I think, locking the customizing on the armor and engine is really too much, why not just limit the range? like i.e. +/- 5 engine size and let people decide on their own how much armor they willing to give up for the engine/weapons or how much on the engine/weapons/ammo they willing to give up for the armor.. its not too bad, and still be "somewhat" balanced.. i say somewhat coz hey clan tech is "OP" by itself already, but also in another stand point, locking armor/engine.. would criple mechs like.. a Hellbringer (unreleased and unannounced, only as an example) but that mech is heavily under armored, for massive amounts of weaponry for it's size.

I'm just saying this for the fact the the amount of freedom on customizing we got on the IS mechs.. made alot of mech's lose it's design purpose like a HBK originally was a support mech. yeah it got that big ac20 on the main design, but yet 64kph made it a walking target rather than a crazy stand alone brawler thats why its normally on guard duty or walking with the assaults
or something like a locust where its meant to go fast.. which crippled it.. since slightly heavier light mechs.. can and will keep up with it, and so can a kintaro which is a 55 ton medium
so how can you really say that clan tech the way it is is too OP?
yeah im more of a clanner as the name implies but as the same time i loved btech when it was tabletop i played both sides and i loved playing both sides, i prefered clan not because of the equipment but more of the challenge to oneself on fighting overwhelming numbers

[Koshirou]

WarHippy, on 30 December 2013 - 02:49 PM, said:

To be fair I said in general, and I implied that some would be better off than others.
The Dire Wolf and Stormcrow will probably be fine as will the Timber Wolf and Warhawk depending on how they handle hit boxes on the Timber Wolf and heat on the Warhawk(for that matter the Dire Wolf and Stormcrow may need to have their proverbial fingers crossed in that regard as well).

Sure, if the designers decide to arbitrarily screw these Mechs on the hitboxes... but I have no reason to believe they will. And if they don't, all IS non-lights are going to be pointless. The Stormcrow is better than everything in the 50-60 ton range, the Timber Wolf is better than everything in the 65-80 ton range, the Warhawk is better than everything in the 85-95 ton range, and the Dire Wolf is better than everything in the 100 ton range.

Alexandrix, on 30 December 2013 - 03:19 PM, said:

What's the spread on that armor? max armor won't mean much if half of it is wasted on rear armor.

In another thread where I talked about this someone claimed the Clan 'Mechs would be screwed because of their allegedly paper-thin rear armor.

Well, judge for yourself: Dire Wolf RCT 28, RRT/RLT 20. Timber Wolf RCT 18, RRT/RLT 14. Would have to look up the others, but I'm quite certain that no canonical 'Mech of the era has anywhere near half its armor on the rear locations.

The only thing that the Clan Mechs, for the most part, will actually lack: Jump Jets. But is that really a crippling disadvantage which is going to balance out their massive firepower advantage. I'll let you decide...



... but the answer is no.

Edited by Koshirou, 31 December 2013 - 02:34 AM.

[Alexandrix]

PGI has really painted itself into a corner here with this ridiculously open customization system,as many said they would.

Had we a more limiting system,just like a lot of people lobbied for back in CB,then mechs would still have their own individuality and purpose.Limit engine size changes,hardpoint sizes,upgrade options,etc.,and every mech would have a flavor,a niche,and a place on the battlefield.Then you wouldn't have to come up with some stupid limitations for clan mechs to try and "balance" them.

Instead,what do we have? a bunch of flavorless gun bags where you just pick the mech with the most tonnage and the hardpoints for whatever you want to boat.G frikkin' G.only not really.

[Darionik]

Not gonna buy anymore a pack, not gonna pay for a "fake" clan technology...
give us a gaming mode for hardcore gamer with collision and economy...i don't care about the game mode of the casual player, keep them separated who cares...

really hope you dont kill the clan tech...keep waithing ceers

[Deathlike]

Some of the mechs will have armor problems (stock designs are bad with stock armor). Given that armor is "fixed" and unchangeable, there will be fragile clan mechs by design.

Some of the mechs will have really large engines (the stock Madcat with the XL375 comes to mind). It will eat into a lot of tonnage to say the least.

[N0t Me]

i really cant understand if people are angry because clan tech will be too good or not good enough.
i have to say i never played any other "MW saga game" other than MWO but from what i can understand clan stuff its really really good compared to IS stuff and introducing both would mean that people just go for the better one leaving the bad one in the dust.
one way to balance this (lazy way) is to give everything a point value, like X mech is worth 10 points while Y mech is worth 15 points and at the end of the day when you go in a match both team need to have a similar point value, this might sound good but does not stop anyone to just upgrade to the better mech to the point you only see clan mech on the field, might work for competitive fights if given a max n of points but not for pugs at all because everyone would go for clan stuff because they like big numbers on the ending screen.

the best way to balance this thing is to give IS stuff a niche they can exploit to be better than clan stuff, but since im no MW expert i dont know what this niche could be, some people say ramming attacks, very hard to implement so very unlikely and probaly not enough, strong heat penalities/advantages on the different mechs.

or just keep the 2 things separate IS only fight IS, clan only fight clan, clan vs IS no mixed teams and with a tonnage/number advantage on the weak mech

[Marcus Tanner]

N0t Me, on 31 December 2013 - 06:22 AM, said:

one way to balance this (lazy way) is to give everything a point value, like X mech is worth 10 points while Y mech is worth 15 points and at the end of the day when you go in a match both team need to have a similar point value, this might sound good but does not stop anyone to just upgrade to the better mech to the point you only see clan mech on the field, might work for competitive fights if given a max n of points but not for pugs at all because everyone would go for clan stuff because they like big numbers on the ending screen.

That's called Battle Value in the tabletop game, and I suspect you've touched on the reason why they won't do that.

[Deimos Pryde]

not sure if anyones already linked it, but theres a post in another section thats got MUCH better ideas on how to make the clan weapons work (and the game more interesting to boot!):

http://mwomercs.com/...ech-done-right/