Every time I read something about the impending change that is the clan mech I feel like they are the much easier option. The details of their superiority have been discussed in a thousand other threads so I won't outline it here. I never played the TT, a little too spread sheety for my tastes, but everything I have read about them gives me the impression that they are not exactly mw on hard mode.
With all of the proposed advantages do you think that PGI will be able to make the experience reflect the honor code of the Clans? I would love to be both rewarded and punished for playing a more difficult type of game but it seems by all accounts that I already play with a more difficult setup (IS mediums). Is this just going to be another min/maxxer paradise or a genuine shift in game play?
Also, if you want to talk about how they are "DOA", I don't agree and you won't be able to convince me in this thread so don't bother. Except for lights, clan lights seemed to be pretty screwed.
They simply can't enforce the clan honor codes. That's an RP thing unfortunately. I don't think they're going to be "easier" but it's going to be different.
The restrictions they're placing on them will offset the more efficient tech I think. I just don't know for sure yet. Once we get more info on hardpoints and such I think it'll be easier to make a decision and give some actual feedback. I think it was a mistake to start discussions on clan tech before we had the full information on them (Which is PGI's fault not the players in this case)
It's also worth noting that the clans abandoned their "honor code" pretty early on when fighting the IS. Many clans view the IS as being barbaric and beneath them and therefore not worth handicapping themselves over.
One Clan got rid of their Honor Code, the Ghost Bears I believe. The rest tried to stay with it. Regardless, it rankles any Clansman worth his salt to fight without honor, and it's not true that they felt the Inner Sphere MechWarrior's unworthy of their honor, because it's not about IS Honor, it's about Clan Honor.
Now, you are absolutely right, the Clan 'Mechs are the happy-shiny munchkin means of fighting in BattleTech, and by God I wish they had never been introduced to BattleTech. They destroyed the game in 1996, and they're going to destroy this game, as well, PERIOD. The OmniMechs are the little kid version of BattleMechs that used to be hardcore, they are there for those who suffer with shiny syndrome, hence your gold 'Mechs, and you might get me into a Clan 'Mech as an Inner Sphere mercenary, but not as long as I can drive one of my classics.
They're junk that shoots really well, and will require little, if any skill to run them out. Unfortunately, even with the nerfs by PGI to a LOT of the tabletop numbers, they're still going to be OP, PERIOD.
There IS a way to deal with the Clan Honor system, on a true mechanical level, but of course that won't be done, because all the happy-shiny munchkins would leave the game. Unfortunately, now the veterans are most likely to leave the game, and it will turn into a min-max state where only the twitch gamers, who want the happy-shiny tech but couldn't give a half-damn about the game or its universe, as long as they get their dakka-dakka on.
There are many things I've done my best to be positive about on these forums, and when this game was going to be set up in the 3025 time-frame, I was sweating and giddy and jumped up and down and screamed at the top of my lungs, because this was finally going to be the game it was always supposed to be. Now, I'm going to stick around and run AU for my friends, but if the game goes to crap as a result of the Clan Omni's, AGAIN, that's all I'll do. How many times can you protest before you have enough 'NO's in your basket that it causes you to shut up and say, "whatever!"
They simply can't enforce the clan honor codes. That's an RP thing unfortunately. I don't think they're going to be "easier" but it's going to be different.
The restrictions they're placing on them will offset the more efficient tech I think. I just don't know for sure yet. Once we get more info on hardpoints and such I think it'll be easier to make a decision and give some actual feedback. I think it was a mistake to start discussions on clan tech before we had the full information on them (Which is PGI's fault not the players in this case)
Clan Honor was never a way to balance a game to begin with. I never played in a game were it was used.
It would never be used in MWO either. However there are some aspects of clan culture that can be adopted in MWO. I think bidding, the batchall, and unit size can fit rather nicely.
Bidding can fit into community warfare, or private matches. The leader of a clan group can set the tonnage limit equal to or lower than the opposing team. The lighter the players group is the more of a bonus they get in C-bills and faction loyalty points they earn.
The batchall can be used to in community warfare as well. Clan players challenge the defenders of a world. The defenders get to pick which map they play on, after the attacking clan units shows their unit information.
Unit sizes are different for clans. Clan faction should have team of ten players made up of two groups of five.
Edited by Dirus Nigh, 08 February 2014 - 09:22 PM.
They simply can't enforce the clan honor codes. That's an RP thing unfortunately. I don't think they're going to be "easier" but it's going to be different.
The restrictions they're placing on them will offset the more efficient tech I think. I just don't know for sure yet. Once we get more info on hardpoints and such I think it'll be easier to make a decision and give some actual feedback. I think it was a mistake to start discussions on clan tech before we had the full information on them (Which is PGI's fault not the players in this case)
Now we know some of the hardpoints (hover over the descriptions in Clan pack page), but we do not know how Clantech itself will be implemented. Until folks see some more info (heat, slots, damage, ROF etc)....I agree that it was premature to open all of this up, but....it undoubtedly provided PGI a shot in the arm in terms of interest and financially (because plenty of people bought those packs already) and that might have been of more pressing concern to them than to smartly, clearly, describe the product they want people to buy.
The construction rules look interesting, but the idea from the forum on incentives won't work out. They have yet to implement weight matching, and while I agree that CV is a good way to go I don't think they could pull it off.
As for why they released the clan packs so early, I agree with Lukoi. They needed a boost to get more people on board and the sales probably helped them.
imho PGI could implement a forced dueling system drop type, where players drop and must 1v1 another player of their tonnage, and no one cannot damage anyone they are not directly dueling.
To make it even and more realistic,the clans should have superior tech but in matches they should drop against a higher number of inner sphere players. Maybe 8 v 12 or something.
Edited by Mechrophilia, 10 February 2014 - 10:54 PM.
...you are absolutely right, the Clan 'Mechs are the happy-shiny munchkin means of fighting in BattleTech, and by God I wish they had never been introduced to BattleTech. They destroyed the game in 1996, and they're going to destroy this game, as well, PERIOD.
I agree with you about how clans really ruined the old TT game. I really stopped following the canon after the 4th Succession War. People talk about Word of Blake and all of that and I nod but I really don't know what they're talking about, nor do I really want to. 3025 was where it was at.
I really hope you're wrong about the Clans ruining MWO, but I am worried you're spot on. I wish PGI would have at least given us a year or two of IS CW before introducing the Clans.
Here's something you may enjoy, if you haven't seen it already...
I love both sides for different reasons. I like the IS because they had to overcome both their internal differences and the clans to have to win the war. I also like Davions better than the IS because being born in Greece but having lived in the US for 95% of my life I associate with them better. And I liked Victor's character in the books. Theodore Kurita was an OK guy too.
In terms of mechs, there are more designs in the IS I like more than in the clans. And by design, I mean the look of, not load outs.
What I liked about the clans were their internal struggle with Crusader vs. Warden and their genetic engineering practices much like Warhammer 40K.
Tycho von Gagern, on 10 February 2014 - 11:11 PM, said:
3025 was where it was at.
Damn skippy! My best memories in BattleTech come from before the Clans, and those were few and far between.
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I really hope you're wrong about the Clans ruining MWO, but I am worried you're spot on. I wish PGI would have at least given us a year or two of IS CW before introducing the Clans.
Unfortunately, there are quite a few of us who are of the opinion that, regardless of the amount of work PGI puts in to balance them out with Inner Sphere units, they will be OP, anyway. Unfortunately, my thoughts are that the highly trained MechWarriors and MechCommanders you would find in the Inner Sphere cannot find their like here on Earth, that all it's going to be is a slugfest and a slaughter because, despite how intelligent, well-read, and military-oriented -for strategy and tactics- many of the members of this community are, they will not be able to overcome the technological differences. Hell, Paul can't even get the weapons balanced for the game, and they're making a brand new pass every time something new comes out. They couldn't stick with an amalgam of the board game numbers, because there are far too many whiny babies out there saying you can't port a tactical board game into a simulation like this. They're wrong, and that's exactly what should be done with weapons and armor, and I have ways to make that a possibility, but PGI wouldn't listen to me if I told them. If they can't balance the IS, that means they can't balance the Clans, no matter how far they go, unless they return to board game numbers, and then back the Clan weapons off slightly.
It's funny, FASA built a solid foundation with play-tested numbers, FanPro and Catalyst picked up on it and continued to run with it, with minor tweaks of their own, but everyone who's developed a MechWarrior game has said the game can't be ported, so they changed fire rates, damage and heat numbers, ammo per ton, whatever they thought it might take to make an amalgam of the game, and each one has overworked themselves, and failed in the end; otherwise, we would still be playing the game that did it right, maybe. Ten second rounds get so much damage and so much heat at such-and-such a range; set a rate of fire, in seconds and half-seconds, whatever, then extend those out until the rate hits a ten-second increment mark, then divide the total damage and heat by the rate over those increments...
PPC, imaginary rate-of-fire every six seconds, meaning 6, (10) 12, 18, (20) 24, (30) 30, or the ability to fire five times in 30 seconds. That's 30 points of damage, or 6 each time the trigger is pulled, and 6 points of heat per time fired, as well. Not difficult to figure out. Now, multiple the damage every six seconds by 100, for 600 damage per hit, and you'll see why in just a minute. What does the player see? Rate-of-Fire 6 seconds, Damage 6, Heat 6, Range ...
A Right Torso location on a board game Highlander 732 has 28 armor. Multiply that by 100, for 2800 armor value. What does the player see? 28 points of armor on the location.
The Highlander gets hit by the PPC once in the Right Torso, it does 600 points of damage; wait the full ten seconds for the PPC to fully charge, it does 1000 points of damage. What does the player see? A reduction from 28 to 22 at the non-fully charged rate, while they see a reduction from 28 to 18 with a full charge at ten seconds.
You want to mess with the ranges, go ahead, but don't make them outrageous. The reason for the hundreds BEHIND THE SCENES rather than doubling the armor up-front, is so we can stick as close to the lore as possible, at least up-front, and because weapons like the Machine Gun are still going to have an enormous rate-of-fire, but they're only going to plink one of the hundreds of points per hit. When a full hundred points is dropped from the armor of a location, one point is lost up-front, what the player sees is the loss of one point; thus, a Machine Gun on full spit will do two points of damage per ten seconds that they're held on target, and will chip away at hundreds of points when they are not on-target for a full round. This is not rocket science.
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Here's something you may enjoy, if you haven't seen it already...
I had not seen the whole thing, only snippets of it, because of how busy I've been, but that's the funniest stuff I've seen in a while. Thank you for sharing it.
PhoenixFire55, on 11 February 2014 - 07:57 AM, said:
They already said they are making a typical FPS game for a typical FPS noob player. So ... no.
PGI has said absolutely no such thing, PF, and you need to pony up proof -links, images, twitter feeds, whatever will make your case- before you EVER say anything THAT STUPID again.
PGI has said absolutely no such thing, PF, and you need to pony up proof -links, images, twitter feeds, whatever will make your case- before you EVER say anything THAT STUPID again.
It's also worth noting that the clans abandoned their "honor code" pretty early on when fighting the IS. Many clans view the IS as being barbaric and beneath them and therefore not worth handicapping themselves over.
That might be what they told themselves to ease their minds, but I have a feeling that the IS wasn't the push-over they believed they would be. It was less a feeling of supremacy and more of a bit of desperation starting to set in when the advance started to stall out. I bet Tukayyid played a big part in that as well.
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