134 replies to this topic

[rollermint]

ManDaisy, on 23 November 2011 - 08:31 PM, said:

Omg for once I find someone who completely agrees with me! Rollermint I applaud your support of legging. Also great idea making cockpit shots permanent pilot death! We should all strive for the most realistic game we can get. But seriously I dont think alpha striking the legs will be much of a problem if they make us stick to stock designs, or fix lasers so that they do damage over time as a laser should instead of instantly. Also, if you dont like legging you might as well be driving a tank.

Glad you like it. Maybe they should allow, you know, real life diseases to impact the in-game player stats as well. Like in the login screen mebbe, player can input "My stomache feels funny"? "The kids are giving me a migraine!" or "Bad fight with gf...". Mech controls feels sluggish, a short delay between firing and the in-game weapon actually firing. Realism heaven.

How about "I'm feeling stupid today?" Works for you? I'm sure mechwarriors in BT universe have realistic health and personal issues that affect their performance. I'm sure you would really love that realism, don't you?

Anyway, I'm perfectly fine if legging just makes ur mech crippled ala MW4. Thats alright. But topple over? Nope, thats dumb.

[rollermint]

feor, on 23 November 2011 - 09:28 PM, said:

On top of that hitting the legs can be a pain in the butt, see, they should be always moving, which means that you alpha strike, and some of your shots from that alpha will probably hit, and you're critically overheating and shutting down, at which point ALL of his shots into your torso will hit.

Its actually pretty damn easy to do in the past iterations of MW and the good mechwarriors will know how to build and control his firing patterns so as to AS without shutting down. I've never played a mech game where people actually stood still, tho. They were all moving. It doesn't actually make it that much harder to hit, particularly with some weapons.

I probably didnt said it clear but I'm not against legging. Its a viable tactic. I'm against mechs toppling over because of legging as that would make it the most overly-used tactic in the game.

Sorry to use WoT as comparison (but its something many are familiar with) but there's a reason why the devs nerfed treading. It used to be so much easier to tread a tank (one shot is all it takes, regardless of cannon size or ammo) but it became overly used and broke the game. Now its much MUCH harder to tread a tank.

Realism is cool but we are not playing a sim bsed on a real war machine.

Edited by rollermint, 23 November 2011 - 11:29 PM.

[Alizabeth Aijou]

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I thought it was just "you have 1 MP from crawling" If you want to use that MP to turn, so be it, if you want to use it to move forward one hex, more power to ya.

Crawling is up to half Walk MP, iirc, minimum of 1.

[Felicitatem Parco]

Upright, bipedal, anthropomorphic Mechs should be susceptible to leg failure just as much as they are susceptible to arm failure. If you think legs should never fail, then why should arms fail?

Maybe critical arm damage should just reduce the rate of fire in your arm weapons instead of severing the arm off... that'd be a terrible idea, but it would go perfectly well with the idea that legs should never fail.

Edited by Prosperity Park, 24 November 2011 - 12:28 PM.

[Red Beard]

If the leg is shot up so bad that it cannot move, then you are rendered completely immobile, and a HUGE liability to the team. If the leg is severed, and I hope that is a possibility, your mech should fall over and be unable to get back up. Anything other than those options really is laughable. Getting back up is ridiculous and crawling would just be a joke.

Hello...this is a VIDEO GAME.

[feor]

Red Beard, on 25 November 2011 - 03:20 PM, said:

If the leg is shot up so bad that it cannot move, then you are rendered completely immobile, and a HUGE liability to the team. If the leg is severed, and I hope that is a possibility, your mech should fall over and be unable to get back up. Anything other than those options really is laughable. Getting back up is ridiculous and crawling would just be a joke.

Hello...this is a VIDEO GAME.

So? You get back up you become a Turret. If you're in an Archer, Longbow, or similar this is entirely viable (especially if you're smart enough to setup some NARCing or a C3 network with your team mates). If you're crawling, well, in game terms just move your viewpoint closer to the ground, pick one arm you can fire with, and slow your movement speed down to about 11Km/h. Would actually not be bad, if your opponent's tracking you by radar, he comes blazing around an corner and fires everything over your unexpectedly prone mech.

And if you're in a mech where neither of those are viable, that's what ejection is for.

Edited by feor, 25 November 2011 - 04:24 PM.

[Melissia]

Melissia, on 20 November 2011 - 01:43 PM, said:

Anyone ever have the idea that a 'mech can roll on its back then sit up and keep firing that way if it loses a leg? Faster if the 'mech still has at least one functioning arm.

Red Beard, on 20 November 2011 - 01:45 PM, said:

Oh good God. Are you kidding? If your mech gets its leg blown off, you are DONE. It's over. Move on.

I still have yet to see a sane, logical, rational, or intelligent reason why people object to this idea if they really are behind "realism"...


Just some whining. Why shouldn't a 'mech pilot be able to fight to the very last breath? It's what a DCMS pilot would do, for example, and probably many Capellan pilots too.

Edited by Melissia, 25 November 2011 - 04:46 PM.

[Pht]

Red Beard, on 21 November 2011 - 10:16 PM, said:

The last post I read from one of the devs was a fairly black and white ordeal. They are using the tabletop GAMES as a reference point, but not really utilizing the rules much.

Considering that we don't know in any meaningful sense what their standard is and what they mean by "reference" it's silly to go out on a limb and try to read their minds on the topic.

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I can dig how a lot of the old TT folks get bent that their game is not on center stage here, but it really cannot translate too well.

With the exception of a single not-insurmountable problem, it translates over almost in the whole and quite well - and would make for a very fun game.

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Not only that, but can you really expect the devs to try and sell a game that is based on a board game that only a few thousand people even know about.

Odd. Video game franchises (and I do not count mechinsult) based off of the boardgame have done well for themselves, selling units up into the millions in toto.

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BTW, thin ice here, so I am gonna leave you with this. It is the IDEAS within the TT game that translate well.

And those ideas come from the ... rules. How you can claim to want the ideas of something while ignoring what defines those ideas is beyond me.

Besides which, you don't pick up the rules and blindly drop them in - you put them in with an eye to what fits the format and the Mechwarrior video game concept.

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By March of 2012, this site will have so many VIDEO GAMERS here, bringing the TT games up in a discussion may well get you laughed out of the room.

Ah, scoffing being posed as valid argument... Gotta love it!

---

Again, we don't know if legging will be a possible issue until we know how they're going to resolve weapons firing/targeting. If there's an appropriate amount of fidelity to the Lore and to realism you won't get to always blast a leg off, every time, as has been done in the other games.

Other than that, MW4 style "ghost legs" ... urgh. Talk about breaking the sense of believability!

Nah, let us crawl in mechs with hands, let us prop our torsos up and blast unsuspecting fools, let us attempt to be crazy with one leg and torso mounted jump-jets...

[Felicitatem Parco]

I remember, back in the day, when I decided which new gaming console to buy. I had always bought Nintendo systems (NES, SNES, Gameboy, N64) but I decided against getting a Gamecube and bought a Xbox instead. I did that for one reason, and one rerason only: This awesome Cyborg Space Marine game called "Halo." It was cool. Many years later (after 4 sequels) they put a group of programmers together and produced a digitally-remastered Halo 10-Year Anniversary Edition.

It was for three reasons. One, it was a technology showcase and beautifully demonstrates the advancements we've made in consumer-grade video graphics in the last ten years. Two, it gave a great Nostalgia trip for us original Halo veterans. Three, well... Three is the exact opposite of Two. Many of the current (as of 2011) consumer-base for Halo video games have never actually played Halo. They're too young to have played the Xbox release title that spawned a lasting franchise. The Halo re-release served to bring disparate gaming communities together. For surely, there will never be perfect harmony between the Elders and the Noobs, but people who talk about playing the original Halo don't get laughed out of the chat room.

I know TT'ers could get a hard time for playing it old-school, but at least they're not throwing paperclips at each other, shouting "Lightning Bolt! Lightning Bolt!"

Edited by Prosperity Park, 26 November 2011 - 09:47 PM.

[Felicitatem Parco]

So... I'm going to start a poll about this legging business.

[Xeratul]

Has anyone played heavy gear? its far from REALISTIC but their solution for a blown up leg is the mech are not able to run and its speed is just reduced to just like walking speed, imagine if a mech would topple if a leg is blown up, im sure all the enemies target reticule would be on the leg, and all the talk about light, med or heavy mech would be nothing as long you can blow up there leg

[Schnuffs]

Be nice if you could ram your mech into another from the side and topple them over, heaver the mech harder to push over/easier to push others.

[Raeven]

Xeratul, on 27 November 2011 - 01:24 AM, said:

Has anyone played heavy gear? its far from REALISTIC but their solution for a blown up leg is the mech are not able to run and its speed is just reduced to just like walking speed, imagine if a mech would topple if a leg is blown up, im sure all the enemies target reticule would be on the leg, and all the talk about light, med or heavy mech would be nothing as long you can blow up there leg

Trust "me" when I say Legging isn't the end all of Battletech. It's a tactic. Depending on how hard it is to hit legs, it could be a rather useless tactic. Depending on how the 'Mechs hitboxes are modelled, it's probably going to be quicker to try and core the 'Mech than it is to take a leg. See, the whole time you are trying to gimp the 'Mech, it's weapons are still fully functional and firing at you.

In MPBT, it was a ignored and shunned tactic for a long time. The reason for this was simple. There were only a handful of chassis to choose from, so many 'Mechs shared the same chassis. For example, most of the humanoid heavy 'Mechs used the Orion or Grasshoppper chassis. The game was Pin Point Accuracy, so how the chassis was modelled played a large part in how effective that chassis was. The Orion chassis was terrible because it's center torso took up a huge portion of the 'Mech. The chassis was nicknamed the coffin 'Mech because the torso had the outline of a coffin and using such a 'Mech meant you were a easy kill. So the 'Mechs that used that chassis were less effective.

The 'Mech that was the most effective were the ones that used the Catapult chassis. See, the way that chassis was moddelled, the cockpit took the place of the center torso. Since hitting the cockpit randomised your shot, you were better off aiming for a location you could hit reliably. You had a small nub (the crotch) that you could aim at to hit the CT, but often enough you would get shaken off your aim and hit a leg, a side torso, or nothing at all. Since the rest of the 'Mech was all legs, it was really the most viable target on the chassis. Early on, people made an unspoken rule that made legging "taboo".

The taboo caught on rather quickly as most people preferred the Catapult chassis to the exclusion of all other heavy 'Mechs. It was a crutch for the weaker of mind or weaker of skill. It wasn't until a small group decided that the legging taboo was a taboo needing to be broken that the game really evolved. Once it became a viable tactic to leg the Catapult chassis, everything changed. 'Mechs that had never had the dust blown off them were suddenly coming out of the woodwork.

So I guess my point is, how effective legging is will depend entirely on how the hitboxes are designed on the 'Mechs. 'Mechs with huge legs are going to get legged. 'Mechs with huge torsoes are going to get cored.

[UncleKulikov]

Raeven, on 27 November 2011 - 02:16 PM, said:

Trust "me" when I say Legging isn't the end all of Battletech. It's a tactic. Depending on how hard it is to hit legs, it could be a rather useless tactic.

And therin lies the pudding proof.

I don't want it to become a doctrine, but as you said, just a tactic.

[Red Beard]

Pht, on 26 November 2011 - 06:28 PM, said:

Considering that we don't know in any meaningful sense what their standard is and what they mean by "reference" it's silly to go out on a limb and try to read their minds on the topic.

Perhaps you should take some time and sift through the FAQ and some of the interviews and articles before you say this. It seems fairly clear to me. What I said was not going out on a limb at all.

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it translates over almost in the whole and quite well - and would make for a very fun game.

To you and a few thousand other people, perhaps. And a few thousand people don't have the power to support this game. We need numbers with a couple more zeros behind it.

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Odd. Video game franchises (and I do not count mechinsult) based off of the boardgame have done well for themselves, selling units up into the millions in toto.

And you are not counting MechAssault BECAUSE...? Perhaps because it was a MUCH better selling product, selling over two and a half million in the U.S. alone. It's funny how that fact gets left out. No other BT game can claim to have sold that many units so quickly. I would guess that most TT folks don't like to add that fact into their discussion because it reflects what most mainstream gamers really want, which ain't a clone of the first several MW games, but a fast paced, action oriented BT game. It really sucks that MS pulled the plug on the servers for MA, but it is also not a reflection of the game's quality, but more of the bureaucracy that goes on inside of the giant corporation.

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And those ideas come from the ... rules.

No disrespect here, but you have this totally backwards. The IDEA for giant walking war machines came first, then the rules for the TT game were created. I cannot see how one could get that mixed up...

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Besides which, you don't pick up the rules and blindly drop them in - you put them in with an eye to what fits the format and the Mechwarrior video game concept.

That's right. And Paul Inouye has, in not so many ways, alluded to the fact that only a small handful of those rules make a good fit.

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Ah, scoffing being posed as valid argument... Gotta love it!

Ah yes. Pht, the person who is perpetually never incorrect. The ability to twist words and re-fashion the truth is a talent few possess and even fewer relish.

---

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Again, we don't know if legging will be a possible issue until we know how they're going to resolve weapons firing/targeting.

Ummm, yeah, we know that. But we are still going to discuss our OPINIONS, thank you.

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Nah, let us crawl in mechs with hands, let us prop our torsos up and blast unsuspecting fools, let us attempt to be crazy with one leg and torso mounted jump-jets...

Cause that would be such go-go mech fun!

[Pht]

Red Beard, on 28 November 2011 - 02:57 PM, said:

Perhaps you should take some time and sift through the FAQ and some of the interviews and articles before you say this.

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It seems fairly clear to me. What I said was not going out on a limb at all.

Perhaps you shouldn't assume you know that I haven't done so.

---

I've read them all, multiple times. I even have them saved onto my hard drive. where, exactly, are they supposed to have directly or indirectly said anything to the meaning of "we are not really utilizing the rules much?"

I certainly didn't see anything that would indicate that they weren't.

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To you and a few thousand other people, perhaps. And a few thousand people don't have the power to support this game. We need numbers with a couple more zeros behind it.

And we all know that there's only a few thousand because ... well, you say so?

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And you are not counting MechAssault BECAUSE...?

It's not a Mechwarrior game. That's why.

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No other BT game...

If mechinsult counts as a valid BT game than a gundam game with its mecha visuals and names stripped and replaced with BT mech visuals and BT mech names also can count as a BT game; because that's about as far as MI went in being a BT Universe game - use of names and some visuals.

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I would guess that most TT folks don't like to add that fact into their discussion because it reflects what most mainstream gamers really want, which ain't a clone of the first several MW games, but a fast paced, action oriented BT game.

What a shocker. Mechwarrior fans like.... mechwarrior! ... not quake with more guns, armor, and run a bit slower. Just shocking!

What did we all ever do before MA came out!

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No disrespect here, but you have this totally backwards. The IDEA for giant walking war machines came first, then the rules for the TT game were created. I cannot see how one could get that mixed up...

Red herring - what you're attributing to me here is not what I posted.

If you want to be that specific, however, the idea of BT came first; and those ideas were first implemented into the boardgame battledroids, and everything that has come after that has been based on it. Even the novels!

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That's right. And Paul Inouye has, in not so many ways, alluded to the fact that only a small handful of those rules make a good fit.

I didn't post that "only a small handful" will work. I'd also like to know where PI has said what you've attributed to him; the more specific (so we don't have to guess) the better!

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Ah yes. Pht, the person who is perpetually never incorrect. The ability to twist words and re-fashion the truth is a talent few possess and even fewer relish.

How is whining that you can't force me to agree with you just because you say I should and than lying about me more valid than your earlier scoffing?

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Ummm, yeah, we know that. But we are still going to discuss our OPINIONS, thank you.

... and it's my *opinion* that it's a somewhat pointless argument - which doesn't mean I also think that the argument shouldn't be had.

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Cause that would be such go-go mech fun!

Compared to MW4 style ghost legs that make less than no sense and completely break any sense of immersion?

Edited by Pht, 29 November 2011 - 05:17 PM.

[DBMKII]

I say the mech should fall over if its leg is blown off, its way more realistic and brings me back to the old mechwarrior which i grew up with and loved so much.

[Red Beard]

Pht, on 29 November 2011 - 05:15 PM, said:

Perhaps you shouldn't assume you know that I haven't done so.

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I've read them all, multiple times. I even have them saved onto my hard drive. where, exactly, are they supposed to have directly or indirectly said anything to the meaning of "we are not really utilizing the rules much?"

I certainly didn't see anything that would indicate that they weren't.



And we all know that there's only a few thousand because ... well, you say so?



It's not a Mechwarrior game. That's why.



If mechinsult counts as a valid BT game than a gundam game with its mecha visuals and names stripped and replaced with BT mech visuals and BT mech names also can count as a BT game; because that's about as far as MI went in being a BT Universe game - use of names and some visuals.



What a shocker. Mechwarrior fans like.... mechwarrior! ... not quake with more guns, armor, and run a bit slower. Just shocking!

What did we all ever do before MA came out!



Red herring - what you're attributing to me here is not what I posted.

If you want to be that specific, however, the idea of BT came first; and those ideas were first implemented into the boardgame battledroids, and everything that has come after that has been based on it. Even the novels!



I didn't post that "only a small handful" will work. I'd also like to know where PI has said what you've attributed to him; the more specific (so we don't have to guess) the better!



How is whining that you can't force me to agree with you just because you say I should and than lying about me more valid than your earlier scoffing?



... and it's my *opinion* that it's a somewhat pointless argument - which doesn't mean I also think that the argument shouldn't be had.



Compared to MW4 style ghost legs that make less than no sense and completely break any sense of immersion?

The more I read your posts, the more I realize that you are like a door chime in a convenience store.

[Red Beard]

DBMKII, on 29 November 2011 - 09:42 PM, said:

I say the mech should fall over if its leg is blown off, its way more realistic and brings me back to the old mechwarrior which i grew up with and loved so much.

You would be surprised at how many people here lack the mental fortitude to agree with such a common sense statement.

Just the idea that a mech could stand after having a leg blown off is funny.

And please don't come at me with what the BT rules say. This is a video game. TT rules need not apply.

[feor]

Red Beard, on 29 November 2011 - 11:03 PM, said:

You would be surprised at how many people here lack the mental fortitude to agree with such a common sense statement.

Just the idea that a mech could stand after having a leg blown off is funny.

And please don't come at me with what the BT rules say. This is a video game. TT rules need not apply.

Why could a mech NOT continue functioning if it had only lost a leg? It would take some damage in the fall of course, but it's not like the pilot's going to go "oh well, I got my leg blown off. Guess I should just call it a day." No, he's going to prop himself up with whatever functioning limbs he's still got and set about causing as much damage to the enemy as he can until they kill him or force him to eject.

And saying "TT rules need not apply" is just being ignorant. The Tabletop rules are what define what a battlemech is and is not capable of. To ignore them is to ignore the fact that this is mechwarrior, based on the battle tech universe. No one says they need to translate over directly from the game into "FPS MegaMek" as I've seen it refered to, but the general concepts are what they need to work towards in terms of what a mech can or cannot do.