9 replies to this topic

[Jam the Bam]

Hi, I was hoping somebody could clear something up for me?

Ive been playing games like mech commander for years (still have it installed ) but I never really got into battletech itself, all I knew is that generally Clan = better, and Madcats rule, and I want the Bushwhacker in game.

I was reading a bit about the difference between Omnimechs and battlemechs on some forums and the impression I got is that from TT:
-Battlemechs: Weapon types were fixed (laser slot/AC slot etc.), equipment was fixed (JJ's, AMS), but engines, internal structure, armour etc were changeable?
-Omnimechs: Mech internals were fixed so armour, structure, engine etc could not be changed. Weapons were modular and were pretty much free to change as much as you want?

If this is the case then it would seem MWO as it is and as its planned re Clans is pretty true to TT, apart from the weapon size/type thing with IS Battlemechs, but otherwise they are going to stick pretty close to the TT rules.

Can anyone with some knowledge of the original game tell me if this is correct?

[Tyrnea Smurf]

Mostly. The thing to remember about IS Battlemechs is that they almost never freely swapped out engines, armor or anything else. In the Succession Wars era the overriding goal was to get that damaged Mech back on the battlefield, so if you had a large fusion powered troop transport or fusion powered train engine you might in desperation try to replace the damaged engine of the mech with one of those, but it wouldn't have been a planned swap to try and tweek the Mechs performance.

Same goes with internal structure, the frame of the Battlemech is the frame. its not really changeable outside of say a arm getting blown off and another arm unit from a differing model mech (but even that new arm has to be really close in terms of weight and weapon feeds) but IS battlemechs were not changeable on the fly.

IIRC the TT construction rules allows you to tinker but with chances of failure and LONG wait times for the modification.

So in a partial answer yes MWO IS Battlemechs allow a great deal of flexability not found for such machines in the TT lore/rules generally.

As to Omni's in TT yes their announced design follows TT rules on Omnis from what they have stated thus far, where some of the pro-clan players are up in arms over these announcements is they are used to MechWarrior 2, 3, & 4, and the MechCommander series which allowed clan Mechs to be fully swappable in just about everything on top of having lighter, tighter, harder, faster, and just plain better tech to play with.

On a personal note I'm at least at ease that PGI is at least trying to reign in clan tech. Simply because I've bought 40+ IS mechs and if the clan machines were designed and built to be OP vs IS as in TT, then my several hundreds of dollars worth of purchases would be worthless overnight in June, as the game would unfailing shift to "run Clan or say home"...

[Durant Carlyle]

Yeppers.

MechWarrior 2-4 ignored the tabletop rules for OmniMechs and made it so you could change everything.

MW:O is (so far) sticking to the tabletop rules for OmniMechs.

This is why a lot of players are up in arms about Omnis.

That plus the fact that the devs have explicitly stated that Clan weapons/equipment would not be the superior tech we have all grown up with and are expecting.

I think they should keep the tabletop restrictions, but also keep the tech superiority. Why? Because they are going to need it. Clan 'Mechs will already be slow and under-armored. Even if the 'Mech has maxed armor, you cannot allocate the armor as you prefer, so you will be more vulnerable.

Example:
Battle at 30 tons
Spider versus Kit Fox
169.3 kph versus 106.9 kph (both with Speed Tweak)
~210 armor versus 152 armor

Just knowing those two things, which one is going to win? I would bet on any of my Spider builds (yes, even my K and V) every single time.

[Nathan Foxbane]

Been pretty much answered here.
A Battlemech can swap anything with no penalty if you had the time to do so. Think weeks for a modification that did not of a chance of going horribly wrong.

Omnimechs had anything that was not pod space or arm actuators locked permanently including the location of ES and FF crits. As long as it obeyed standard Battlemech construction rules it could be mounted in pod space. Hands being a special case in that the could not be mounted in the same arm carrying a Gauss Rifle, Autocannon of any kind, or PPC of any kind.

[RedDragon]

Durant Carlyle, on 10 January 2014 - 10:59 AM, said:

This is why a lot of players are up in arms about Omnis.

Nah, they are up in arms because if PGI make Clans the way they proposed, IS mechs will be more omni than omni mechs. They took the sentence "An OmniMech's structural components (its engine, internal structure, armor and any equipment installed on the base chassis of OmniMech) are "hard-wired" and cannot be modified outside of a total redesign of the 'Mech." totally out of context. The internals of an OmniMech are as hard-wired as those of any IS-mech. Following TT lore, you shouldn't be able to modify IS mechs at all or only in a very limited fashion because larger modifications are in fact a redesign of the mech that can only be done with lots of time, money and a Battlemech factory.

So in short: Battlemechs can't swap out any equipment on the fly. Every change is a redesign of the mech that needs at least some heavy equipment, lots of techs and time to do and this can't be done in the field most of the time.
Omnimechs have weapon pots that you can swap out without greater logistical work. It can be done in the field with minimal effort.
Regarding structure, armor, engine etc. both Battlemechs and Omnimechs are perfectly the same. They can't change anything without a huge effort, lots of time, money and equipment, and then it will be a redesign of the whole mech.

[Egomane]

I'm a bit confused here...

Is this thread about the difference of Battlemech and Omnimechs in general?
- Then it would be fine in this sub forum and the MWO discussion doesn't belong here.

or

Is this thread about how PGI is planning to implement the clan mechs and the users reaction to it?
- Then this thread would belong in the upcoming features sub-forum.

Which one is it?

[Skylarr]

I guess that since it is asking if PGI will stick to TT rules when dealing with the Non-Omnis and Omnis that belongs in the MW:O section.

[Egomane]

Guess you are correct.

Moving!

[General Taskeen]

RedDragon, on 10 January 2014 - 11:33 AM, said:

Nah, they are up in arms because if PGI make Clans the way they proposed, IS mechs will be more omni than omni mechs. They took the sentence "An OmniMech's structural components (its engine, internal structure, armor and any equipment installed on the base chassis of OmniMech) are "hard-wired" and cannot be modified outside of a total redesign of the 'Mech." totally out of context. The internals of an OmniMech are as hard-wired as those of any IS-mech. Following TT lore, you shouldn't be able to modify IS mechs at all or only in a very limited fashion because larger modifications are in fact a redesign of the mech that can only be done with lots of time, money and a Battlemech factory.

So in short: Battlemechs can't swap out any equipment on the fly. Every change is a redesign of the mech that needs at least some heavy equipment, lots of techs and time to do and this can't be done in the field most of the time.
Omnimechs have weapon pots that you can swap out without greater logistical work. It can be done in the field with minimal effort.
Regarding structure, armor, engine etc. both Battlemechs and Omnimechs are perfectly the same. They can't change anything without a huge effort, lots of time, money and equipment, and then it will be a redesign of the whole mech.

Exactly in the boardgame both player teams propose the rules to use. So if beforehand, both teams decide, "Hey, let's build some custom Mechs, but lets go by these rules" etc., then that is what they do. In more "classical" rule-set (where there is no customizing), depending on what you are doing, you roll for your Mech variant or pick one, whatever, then you battle it out with a Stock Clan Mech and/or IS Mech.

Mech Warrior is a different beast, since they always allow customization in the games, more "open ended," but in the past there were public and private servers (most important distinction) so you could either join some random server that has "anything goes" attitude or you got with your buddies, decided on who could take what and how the mech could be built (not customized, half-customized, or fully customized) and then go at it in a private server. MWO has NONE of those options.

So in essence, what MWO actually has is "Mech Warrior" ruleset (mostly anything goes, with "sort of" restrictions) in random Matches. You can't decide on your enemy, there are no historical battles, and you can't choose the battle location. And then along comes the idea to put FULL TT Clan Mech ruleset and throw into a random Match game that has "Mech Warrior" rulesets for IS Mechs. Its insane is what it is.

PGI needs to allow customization for both, but add lobbies and private servers as options for those that don't want to join the "anything goes" random mode and playtheir matches on their own terms. So if some Mech Warriors want to get together and duke it out with Stock Clan and IS Mechs, they could do that, or they decide on some "limited customization" for "legal customized builds" or just do whatever they want.

Edited by General Taskeen, 10 January 2014 - 05:05 PM.

[Jam the Bam]

Egomane, on 10 January 2014 - 11:39 AM, said:

I'm a bit confused here...

Is this thread about the difference of Battlemech and Omnimechs in general?
- Then it would be fine in this sub forum and the MWO discussion doesn't belong here.

or

Is this thread about how PGI is planning to implement the clan mechs and the users reaction to it?
- Then this thread would belong in the upcoming features sub-forum.

Which one is it?

Its about understanding the historical tabletop and lore based difference between the two mech designs, the part about PGI making the mechs fairly true was more of a comment, I though battletech discussion would be the best place to find a good answer to my question about whether I had the right idea about their original design, I can make the comparison myself.

Speaking of, thanks for the replies guys, that helps clear up things a lot, its interesting how the rules appear to worded in that IS mechs can change their structure etc but in reality an actual change would be completely unrealistic in a game.

Personally when it comes to the game I wouldn't be opposed to them resetting all IS mechs to their standard config and allowing little change so people have to play in a way that reflects their original design, would actually give me a reason to play something other than my AC20 toting BJ, and actually reflect the original game and lore in some form.