18 replies to this topic

[Cordel Ordo]

I know people are probably tired of these balance threads concerning Clan vs IS but I have a new idea. Instead of focusing on the clans themselves focus on their guns. Like many I think that Clans should be AI for the first year or so. But since many will be happy to get clan gear through salvage or buying in the shop but as a counter-balance I think Clan weapons mounted on IS designs should be flawed.

By flawed I mean that since the Clans are more advanced than the Inner Sphere an Inner Sphere tech no matter how skilled he is would be able to install the clan gear perfectly. Sure the weapons evolved from the same time but maybe clan techs found a way of more efficient hookups for lasers and Autocannons so the standard hookups IS techs use wouldn't be there forcing them to jury-rig something to get the weapons connected.

This should be shown in game by way of faults in battle. What I mean is at random times during battle any clan tech equipped to player 'mechs has a chance of going offline for a short time. The weapon will eventually come back online until about halfway through the match where depending on the damage to the armor section where the weapon is installed the weapon has a 25-50% chance to go offline permanently. Also for if they include criticals make player clan weapons take two critical hits to knock out, this is balanced by once the first critical hit on the weapon has a 75% of going offline permanently. This phenomenon should only exist for the first year or year and a half as the IS tech struggle to learn Clan tech.

I think this promotes a high risk/high reward scenario, do you completely load out on Clan tech and risk being useless by mid match if it all fails? Or do you stick to the tried and true tech you know works all the time. What do you guys think of this idea?

[Death Mallet]

There's not going to be any salvage is my understanding. And its way to early to talk about the introduction of clan stuff since its a ways away. Don't worry about it for right now.

[Cordel Ordo]

Alright I just thought I would add my .02 to the debate. I'll quit worrying for now though.

[Team Leader]

Dude. youre just gonna get shut down like that? lol but I think thats an interesting idea, but those percentages would def have to be tweaked. Otherwise interesting concept.

[Strum Wealh]

Cordel Ordo, on 13 June 2012 - 03:00 PM, said:

I know people are probably tired of these balance threads concerning Clan vs IS but I have a new idea. Instead of focusing on the clans themselves focus on their guns. Like many I think that Clans should be AI for the first year or so. But since many will be happy to get clan gear through salvage or buying in the shop but as a counter-balance I think Clan weapons mounted on IS designs should be flawed.

By flawed I mean that since the Clans are more advanced than the Inner Sphere an Inner Sphere tech no matter how skilled he is would be able to install the clan gear perfectly. Sure the weapons evolved from the same time but maybe clan techs found a way of more efficient hookups for lasers and Autocannons so the standard hookups IS techs use wouldn't be there forcing them to jury-rig something to get the weapons connected.

This should be shown in game by way of faults in battle. What I mean is at random times during battle any clan tech equipped to player 'mechs has a chance of going offline for a short time. The weapon will eventually come back online until about halfway through the match where depending on the damage to the armor section where the weapon is installed the weapon has a 25-50% chance to go offline permanently. Also for if they include criticals make player clan weapons take two critical hits to knock out, this is balanced by once the first critical hit on the weapon has a 75% of going offline permanently. This phenomenon should only exist for the first year or year and a half as the IS tech struggle to learn Clan tech.

I think this promotes a high risk/high reward scenario, do you completely load out on Clan tech and risk being useless by mid match if it all fails? Or do you stick to the tried and true tech you know works all the time. What do you guys think of this idea?

I generally agree, though I think it should work both ways (that is, for IS tech on Clan 'Mechs as well as Clan tech on IS 'Mechs).

Clan tech isn't intended to be compatible with IS tech, or vice versa; there was a reason why it generally took Elite-level technicians (Skill Target 5+) with substantial penalties (+4 modifier) to do it in the TT game (CBT Master Rules, pg. 87, 91-92).

I would keep the percentage-chance-of-failure for permanent failure relatively high, albeit at the lower side of the stated range; 20-25% (1-in-5 to 1-in-4) seems about right to me, given that IS and Clan tech isn't supposed to be cross-compatible.
Though, it should be noted that attaching IS weapons to Clan 'Mechs should, IMO, have an identical percentage-chance-of-failure.

However, I think that "1-critical-hit = disabled" should be maintained (especially as there are many weapons and equipment items, both IS and Clan, that only occupy one critical).

Your thoughts?

[Rodney28021]

No salvage, no clans yet, The game have not even released. Yeah, 1 critical hit = disabled it the best way to go. Bring this up later when the time comes.

[Grokmoo]

I think the majority of players would find a mechanic where their equipment randomly stops working very frustrating.

[Alex Iglesias]

yeah i'm gonna have to disagree with this approach, as it could very easily leave mechs that rely on only 1 or 2 weapon systems crippled and harmless early in a fight, and conversely still leave overpowered equipment overpowered up until it randomly breaks which is not something that is all that comforting if your mech got handedly obliterated when the enemy equipment was functioning properly.

it also has little impact on small weapon boats, as a mech that's decked out in clan er mediums or smalls probably won't be too inconvenienced by 1 or 2 lasers or lrm 5s failing if he's got 10 more.

I'm no designer, this is purely my opinion, but i'd rather see properly balanced weapon stats: so that while clan gear is still more high performance and efficient, it's not necessarily better in every way. crusty IS gear should still remain a viable or attractive option with clan and star league era gear about.

Price-wise and availability wise they should be hard to get and hard to maintain if you aren't a clanner yourself.

I don't like how past MW games, the entire IS half of the equipment spectrum is totally unused outside of League matches and personal handicaps simply because there is no good reason to.

[Rodney28021]

nice, a dev chimed in on this thread.

[Alex Iglesias]

well, for what's it's worth,
i just draw the stuff.

[Rodney28021]

Alex can you chime in on weapon / mech customization and say how much more work that would be for you?

[Alex Iglesias]

can't really say. but that wouldn't be much work for me as it would be work for the rest of the art team.

[Deathz Jester]

Alex Iglesias, on 14 June 2012 - 09:04 AM, said:

well, for what's it's worth,
i just draw the stuff.

You (and anyone you work with excluding Paul) create art lol

Also I agree with the past incarnations of mechwarrior basically rendering IS tech pointless once you obtain enough clan tech. Oh I have a dropship full of IS tech? Why use it when I have another dropship full of Clan tech?

[wolf74]

Personally if people want to use Clan Gear than they have to play as Clanner and follow Clan Rules as put down by the Lore & Dev Team. If they don’t like said rules To Bad. You can have Cake (I.S. Tech) Or Pie (Clan Tech) but Not both. Just my Personal Feeling on it.

[Torban]

If clan weapons and mechs have a chance to be destroyed permanently while inner sphere tech does not. Then clan tech will be valuable resource and risky to run so you may only want to run IS gear unless an important battle is going on. I can't see a way to have clan weapons actually balanced so the difficulty of maintaining and acquiring full clan tech would be the only way to discourage it. Of course this creates it's own issues depending on how the premium system works because if being premium makes it easy to maintain a full loadout of clan tech then it would be essentially selling power.

Maybe the game should have just been at a much earlier year because clan tech will be such a headache to balance. Hopefully they'll be able to find a solution but it's a difficult task.

Edited by Torban, 14 June 2012 - 10:38 AM.

[Lycan]

wolf74, on 14 June 2012 - 09:55 AM, said:

Personally if people want to use Clan Gear than they have to play as Clanner and follow Clan Rules as put down by the Lore & Dev Team. If they don’t like said rules To Bad. You can have Cake (I.S. Tech) Or Pie (Clan Tech) but Not both. Just my Personal Feeling on it.

I agree with this.

The problem, as I see it, is enforcement. The checks and balances of the superior clan tech are all fluff based. Unless the Devs hard code something that forces Clan players to follow all the rules and regs of being a member of the clans then it's just so much smoke and mirrors.

[Colddawg]

Do you not remember that they said "a Binary vs 3 lances?"

That means 10 'Mechs vs 12.
It may not seem like much, but the clan balance is probably going to have smaller tonnage than IS teams as well as 2 less 'Mechs.

Edited by Colddawg, 14 June 2012 - 09:12 PM.

[phelancracken]

Yep. Or if they have piloting modifiers, I realize specualtion here, the IS would have a piloting advantage.

[Fire for Effect]

I keep repeating myself, but this "problem" has already been solved in the boardgame about 20 years ago.

The Battlemech Record Sheet series from 1991 already had Point values assigned to each mech. later publication had a wealth of methods to calculate battle value or BPV. There is a multitude of lists in the Annex of practically any Battletech sourcebook. These point systems worked quite well for more than a decade. No reason to invent something new if you already have a working system.