64 replies to this topic

[Alistair Winter]

First, here's the definition of "game balance" for this thread. Please keep that in mind:

Good game balance means

• all types of lasers, ballistics and missiles are equally viable.
  
• weapons with short, medium and long range are equally viable
  
• carrying a combination of the above or boating a single type of weapon is equally viable, with a few exceptions

In other words, a mech with long range lasers and ballistics is no more or less viable than a mech with short range lasers and ballistics or a mech with only ER lasers. They just have different advantages and disadvantages.

Of course, the balance between different mechs (e.g. Tier 1 vs Tier 5) and weight classes (e.g. light mech vs heavy mech balancing) is related to the issue, but I'm mainly talking about weapons and equipment.

We've been through LRMapocalypse, Splatcats, Age of Squawk, Poptart bonanza, the pre-ghost heat Laser Stalker massacre and much, much more. So... what more needs to be done before we've finally reached the good spot in game balance? Are we there yet or is PGI nowhere close to solving the real issues?

Interested in hearing the community's thoughts on this, before I voice my own opinion.

[Satan n stuff]

LRMs are still wildly inconsistent and almost useless against good players, boating is still vastly superior to anything else as long as tonnage, crit space and hardpoints allow, AC/2s are still terrible for actually killing anything, but compared to the poptart days things are looking much better overall. We've still got a long ways to go though, and I doubt the game will be close enough to balanced by the time the next set of tech is released.

Edit: forgot to mention flamers, which are so useless I don't even consider them a weapon anymore. Damage/heat toggle might improve it considerably as it allows for more focused firepower without making it gamebreaking.

Edited by Satan n stuff, 19 November 2014 - 01:26 PM.

[Tombstoner]

You have 3 criteria for equally viable. how do you determine viability? What is viable? that i can bring 4 pulse lasers and deliver the same damage as 4 ppcs just with many more shots... all weapons have the same frequency of selection...I'm trying but i cant see a way to quantify viability. This is going to be a purely subjective discussion unless we can assign something like frequency of weapon taken relative to damage delivered. A weapon that sucks wouldn't be taken very often nor would it deliver damage.

So good game balance becomes purely subjective. Thus this is it. what more could be done besides more tweeks vs. a complete rework that cant be done until MWO2.0.

[Sachimon]

95% almost good balance.

[Alistair Winter]

Tombstoner, on 19 November 2014 - 01:23 PM, said:

You have 3 criteria for equally viable. how do you determine viability? What is viable? that i can bring 4 pulse lasers and deliver the same damage as 4 ppcs just with many more shots... all weapons have the same frequency of selection...I'm trying but i cant see a way to quantify viability. This is going to be a purely subjective discussion unless we can assign something like frequency of weapon taken relative to damage delivered. A weapon that sucks wouldn't be taken very often nor would it deliver damage.
So good game balance becomes purely subjective. Thus this is it. what more could be done besides more tweeks vs. a complete rework that cant be done until MWO2.0.

It makes no sense to discuss balance if you're going to use this kind of relativistic logic, where everything is subjective and depends on taste and playstyle and skill. A viable build is one that is particularly effective. Builds that are not viable are not particularly effective. Generally, mechs with viable builds will do more damage, get more kills and have more victories than mechs without viable builds. We're particularly interested in statistics and averages.

There may be one guy from Peru who's a specialist with a flamer boating build, gets better results with that build than any other build and is better at the game than anyone else, but that's not very important if other people are unable to emulate him successfully.

If you go back 12 months, mechs boating small pulse lasers were not viable. Today, many people would argue that they are worth using again, that they are finally viable. That should give you some indication of what kind of progress we're discussing here.

[Tombstoner]

Alistair Winter, on 19 November 2014 - 01:35 PM, said:

It makes no sense to discuss balance if you're going to use this kind of relativistic logic, where everything is subjective and depends on taste and playstyle and skill. A viable build is one that is particularly effective. Builds that are not viable are not particularly effective. Generally, mechs with viable builds will do more damage, get more kills and have more victories than mechs without viable builds. We're particularly interested in statistics and averages.

There may be one guy from Peru who's a specialist with a flamer boating build, gets better results with that build than any other build and is better at the game than anyone else, but that's not very important if other people are unable to emulate him successfully.

If you go back 12 months, mechs boating small pulse lasers were not viable. Today, many people would argue that they are worth using again, that they are finally viable. That should give you some indication of what kind of progress we're discussing here.

Yes i agree and we must assign numbers to them and we can talk, otherwise its a purely subjective discussion based on what people think they see in game. Only PGI can answer this question and i would like to know how they evaluate viable.... i think its simply from the rate of frequency taken not necessary used in combat. but thats complicated by hard points and crit spaces.

I just spent 7 hours today reading up on statistic and process controls leading into Measurement systems analysis.

Without numbers this can only be a subjective assessment. Give me numbers and I'll graph it for the answer.

Subjectively i think the ac2 is fubar. its range is too short. PPC shot speed is too slow. LRM range and speed is too short and slow. thats befor we get into IS vs. Clan.

[The Boz]

You forgot ALL MECH TYPES, ROLES AND WEIGHT CLASSES ARE EQUALLY VIABLE.

[Cygone]

AC2 - CRAP
Flamer - CRAP
LRM - Inconsistent.
Clan Mechs - Need E + F Customisation

Pretty much done after those.

[DasSibby]

Cygone, on 19 November 2014 - 01:59 PM, said:

AC2 - CRAP
Flamer - CRAP
LRM - Inconsistent.
Clan Mechs - Need E + F Customisation

Pretty much done after those.

I completely agree. But mostly I want my AC2 back... (and my IS dakka...)

[KraftySOT]

AC2 is pretty much supposed to be crap.

Beyond that, yeah were really good everywhere but the Flamer, and the LRM. The Flamer is utterly pointless, and the LRM is inconsistent.

It needs to be marginally effective, all the time. Never really effective, never not effective at all. Its feast of famine gameplay lends itself to horrible balance. Its either useless, or over powering, but rarely inbetween. It should be marginally useful, and smart to have a team with a few lrms, but folly to have multiple boats, in both the group AND solo queues, all the way up to the competitive level.

I dont play clan mechs so I cant speak to that. But the balance issue list is short now.

[FupDup]

Basically, the main things that seem to be craptastic at the moment are:

• AC/2
  
• SL (Clan version might be fine though?)
  
• LRM20 (Bad spread and long cooldown)
  
• AC/10 (not horrible, but fairly sub-par)
  
• Flamers
  
• MGs (for starters, remove that damn CoF from it...)
  
• SHS
  
• Ferro Fibrous Armor
  
• Standard Internal Structure
  
• All LB-X ACs excluding the LB 5-X (and even that might be able to use a nudge?)
  
• Normally I'd put in most pulse lasers here, but most of them seem to be actually acceptable after the laser pass. Will have to observe them longer to decide.
  
• Clan UACs and regular ACs (especially the regular ACs, ugh...)
  
• SRM2

Edited by FupDup, 19 November 2014 - 07:24 PM.

[KraftySOT]

Yeah not only was Wub good last month, but its even better now. 50-60 pin point alphas are nothing to sneeze at.

And coupled with some of the quirks....pfffft. Firing 4 LPL without ghost heat is hilariously good. And at increased range. Theres still alot of mechs that medium lasers always make more sense...but the Wubfactor has hit an all time high.

But again I dont play clan, so I have no idea what the wub situation is like over thar.

But my observation with at least 1,000 matches of Wub over the past year...is that Wub was always situationally good, and now its just good, with a slight helping of great, depending on your mech. Wubshee, Thunderwub, Wubberiiiine, or even the Wubada, are all pretty good. And the Wubstarter....FFS that thing with 8 small pulse.

Edited by KraftySOT, 19 November 2014 - 02:14 PM.

[Alek Ituin]

Satan n stuff, on 19 November 2014 - 01:21 PM, said:

Edit: forgot to mention flamers, which are so useless I don't even consider them a weapon anymore. Damage/heat toggle might improve it considerably as it allows for more focused firepower without making it gamebreaking.

Switch it from a wide area torch, to a focused plasma cutter, and back. I like it.

(Yes, since our flamers are obviously fueled by our reactors, they're plasma torches. 4.5*10^7 Kelvin plasma pouring out of a tiny vent...)

[Felicitatem Parco]

You need to drop Condition#3 because mixing and matching weapons can make weapon combonations very unviable, even if the weapons (themselves) are viable.

You can't pin the definition of "viability" or "balance" to the ability to mix every/any weapons on the same Mech. That's folly.

Edited by Prosperity Park, 19 November 2014 - 02:17 PM.

[Star Witch Esperanza]

Alistair Winter, on 19 November 2014 - 01:01 PM, said:

First, here's the definition of "game balance" for this thread. Please keep that in mind:

Good game balance means

• all types of lasers, ballistics and missiles are equally viable.
  
  
  
  
  

Weapon systems keep getting nerfed by what can boat them, leaving many of them rather underwhelming in a mech that cant field too many while leaving the mechs that -can- boat them in a place where they are still powerful.

Alistair Winter, on 19 November 2014 - 01:01 PM, said:

weapons with short, medium and long range are equally viable

Right now the current meta seems to be largely skewed towards long range pinpoint and lrm damage with close ranger brawler builds being in the minority. some of the maps being excessively large also encourages setting up these kinds of builds, making teams largely very pensive about trying to close gaps and brawl.

Alistair Winter, on 19 November 2014 - 01:01 PM, said:

carrying a combination of the above or boating a single type of weapon is equally viable, with a few exceptions

Boating is typically the way to go in anything lighter than an assault mech for inner sphere. The damage to tonnage return and killing potential of multi-system loadouts just doesnt stack up for all but a few IS mechs.

Clan mechs however, because of higher range/damage weapon systems can absolutely afford to divide their firepower up unto multiple versatile weapon systems. I'm very comfortable jumping into a stock timberwolf prime for example, which has six weapon groups.


Edit: Most of the core problems with balance and the balance development cycle have been easily identifiable for a long time. However we probably are long past the point where we can take hardpoints away from variants, a lot of refunds would be asked for and a lot of free mc would have to be awarded so other solutions probably have to be explored.

which unfortunately probably amounts to putting more systems people hate onto boating.

Edited by Nephera, 19 November 2014 - 02:31 PM.

[AntiCitizenJuan]

This is the best it has been in a very, very long time.

You should be able to tell on your own HUD when you've been NARC'd.

Maps need some reworking (Alpine, Caustic, River City)

Everything Fup said

Edited by AntiCitizenJuan, 19 November 2014 - 02:24 PM.

[Sandpit]

Balance is slanted towards short range combat and increasing TTK. By that I mean long range weapons have been consistently nerfed for the past year. With that said, with a few exceptions such as burn times (which are markedly better than they were 3 months ago but still a bit too much in my opinion) and velocity speeds, I think MWO has a decent balance at the moment.

The quirks have gone a long way to helping balance. In a game like this balance is going to be extremely tricky and fickle. The main problem that' hampered balance in general has been PGI's knee jerks to nerf or buff a singular weapon system based on boats. So the boats become more balanced but anyone NOT running a boat tends to get nerfed into oblivion. I still see that mentality in most of the balance passes and until PGI acknowledges that a splatcat isn't representative of srms or ssrms and that it's a representative of a singular build boating that weapon system we won't get a "good" balance.

With all of THAT said, balance is decent and quirks are doing a decent job of helping that and I think PGI has a good opportunity with the quirks to achieve a better balance in weapons and builds.

[Mitsuragi]

The weapons themselves are more or less in a fine state. I think the issue is how fast the ROF is now. We have mechs alpha'ing 5-7 weapons 3-4 times. This takes the '30-point' alpha PGI likes and throws it out the window.

[Cyborne Elemental]

FupDup, on 19 November 2014 - 02:08 PM, said:

Basically, the main things that seem to be craptastic at the moment are:

• AC/2
  
• SL (Clan version might be fine though?)
  
• LRM20 (Bad spread and long cooldown)
  
• AC/10 (not horrible, but fairly sub-par)
  
• Flamers
  
• MGs (for starters, remove that damn CoF from it...)
  
• SHS
  
• Ferro Fibrous Armor
  
• Standard Internal Structure
  
• All LB-X ACs excluding the LB 5-X (and even that might be able to use a nudge?)
  
• Normally I'd put in most pulse lasers here, but most of them seem to be actually acceptable after the laser pass. Will have to observe them longer to decide.

This
+ Hitreg
+ making clan ballistics worthwhile over LRM's (mostly making standard AC variants not suck)

[FupDup]

Mister D, on 19 November 2014 - 02:31 PM, said:

This
+ Hitreg
+ making clan ballistics worthwhile over LRM's (mostly making standard AC variants not suck)

I almost forgot about Clan ACs. I'll edit them in.