180 replies to this topic

[Phasics]

John Hartson, on 27 June 2012 - 05:31 AM, said:

The Hunchback in the developer video has two tons of ammo for the AC/20 in the left torso.

That information isn't useful unless you know how many AC20 rounds it takes to kill an atlas shooting its torso.

In fact without any decent numbers of rounds required to destroy X/mech you don't even know if doubling ammo is sufficient or overpowered.

[Silversteel]

zencynic, on 27 June 2012 - 05:20 AM, said:

I disagree sir. All the Dev released videos I can recall have show double armor, with no modification to weapon damage or ammo/ton.

Okay doubled armor even i could see but how did u spot the dmg of the weapon???

[Diomed]

Doubling the armor is a bad idea...period.

This gaming system has decades of work behind it. You don't take a system this mature and simply double something without taking a long, close look at the entire system.

They should have at least doubled the ammo for any ballistic system and even this won't fix the nerf to autocannon's strong, single damage location alpha. You throw the entire energy vs. ballastic balance into chaos when you do things like this. Also bear in mind that ammo can explode and ruin your day, something an energy-based mech does not have to worry about.

This is not a good sign that the devs know what they are doing.

Edited by Diomed, 27 June 2012 - 06:06 AM.

[Voyager I]

Everything has to be rebalanced when you make the transition from a turn-based table top game where time happens in discrete 10 second increments to realtime first-person.

This is just the first time we've seen direct numbers to make comparisons from.

Edited by Voyager I, 27 June 2012 - 06:16 AM.

[Skoll Lokeson]

Maybe it's just a different scale. 1 BT:TT armor point = 2 MWO armor points.

Changing the speedometer on a car from mph to kph doen't make the car faster or give a driver an unfare advantage as far I know.

I don't know why the armor value is "doubled", but it dosen't have to mean that the armor can absorb twice the damage.

Edited by Skoll Lokeson, 27 June 2012 - 06:20 AM.

[Uri Brauer]

Interesting observation. Doubling ammo does seem like the obvious answer, though there are other ways to rebalance it.
Issues this big should be blindingly obvious in the beta testing, though... bearing in mind that devs will be keeping an eye out for laser-boats anyway.

[zencynic]

Silversteel, on 27 June 2012 - 06:01 AM, said:

Okay doubled armor even i could see but how did u spot the dmg of the weapon???

Good catch. I did not recall seeing any change to weapon damage. Somewhere along the way, my brain flipped that around to "I saw it and it had not changed"

Perhaps Large lasers are now doing 16 damage and AC/20s are doing 40.

Perhaps they have implemented something new.

Ok, I am back in the wait and see camp

[Dagger6T6]

The "golden" guns do more damage so it will balance out... just buy a Gold AC/20 for your Hunchie and you will be all good. Maybe equip some "Legendary" ammo too for an extra punch and bonus to rate of fire. These items only available to Legendary Founders of course.





*disclaimer - the above statement may or may not be in the actual game, it was only surmised by watching leaked beta footage with my eyes closed ,while in a dark room.

[DrKippy]

Diomed, on 27 June 2012 - 06:05 AM, said:

Doubling the armor is a bad idea...period.

This gaming system has decades of work behind it. You don't take a system this mature and simply double something without taking a long, close look at the entire system.

They should have at least doubled the ammo for any ballistic system and even this won't fix the nerf to autocannon's strong, single damage location alpha. You throw the entire energy vs. ballastic balance into chaos when you do things like this. Also bear in mind that ammo can explode and ruin your day, something an energy-based mech does not have to worry about.

This is not a good sign that the devs know what they are doing.

It's a good sign that you're getting nicely worked up without reason.

Voyager I, on 27 June 2012 - 06:16 AM, said:

Everything has to be rebalanced when you make the transition from a turn-based table top game where time happens in discrete 10 second increments to realtime first-person.

This is just the first time we've seen direct numbers to make comparisons from.

Exactly. This.

My assumption:
They want the fights to last longer so they're more fun and engaging, and probably a bit less "one good shot crippled me".
They're using the numbers for the tabletop as a starting point, and since the closed beta has just begun, they're likely watching what happens, and working on adjusting damage/weight/volume etc to give the game the appropriate balance & feel they want.

It's not trivial, takes time, and something I'm sure they're well aware of and paying very close attention to.

Think of something like counter-strike when it changed game engines. Almost the same game, simply moving from one engine to another with slightly different feels in the engine. It needed balancing and consideration just for that, and was a slightly different game (not that I was a big CS player of any variety, so I can't get specific). Moving from a table-top to a FPS style game requires a great deal of effort to balance the gameplay as well as getting the correct "feel" they're hoping for.

In all likeliness something will indeed change, but simply doubling ammo won't necessarily give the results we all want.

Suggesting ineptitude because all the answers aren't available during the Beta (the period for exactly this kind of stuff) is presumptive at best.

Edited by DrKippy, 27 June 2012 - 06:53 AM.

[AlanEsh]

Silversteel, on 27 June 2012 - 06:01 AM, said:

Okay doubled armor even i could see but how did u spot the dmg of the weapon???

That's silly -- there would be ZERO point to doubling armor -and- double weapon damage, because that just puts you back at original armor/damage ratios.
The devs have stated that they are doubling armor to make matches last longer. For that to be true they can't be doubling damage as well

[Rixx]

Doubling the armor is NEEDED due to the changes from a TT game to a 1st person video game. In the table top game, you couldn't aim your shot, so the damage from the 5 shots of an AC20 were spread around. You could rip off both arms, and land a shot on each torso and the mech could still be fighting you.
In the video game, you can aim your shots. Using TT armor numbers we'd rip through mechs in only a few volleys which honestly wouldn't be much fun, especially to newer players. This forces players to select their shots though due to limited ammo. And maybe, just maybe, you'll need to pack an extra ton of ammo to make up for the difference.
So now that we have that issue out of the way, lets deal with the problem that still remains.

Missles and to a lesser extent, LBX weaponry. Missles can't be targetted like ACs/Lasers. You fire them, they arc up and then down at the target and apply their damage randomly...just like in the TT game. The increase in armor is to compensate for the ability to target accurately....with weapons that can't target accurately, there is an issue.

There are 2 solutions.
A. double the ammo per ton. This would allow us to do the same amount of damage, but it would also have other affects. It would allow us to stay in the battle longer. This would change the game significantly. Less possibility of running out of ammo, less need to stock extra tons of ammo (affects tonnage and explosive threats). I'd prefer B.
B. double the damage from untargetable weaponry. This would mean we have exactly the same ammo as the TT game which wouldn't change the tactical dynamics at all. The double damage would compensate for the increased armor.

[Roguewolf]

Almost certainly this is something that was done for versatility and balance, and there will be a counter balance to it. Somehow I think with this much loyalty to the original TRO book built into the game so far, I seriously doubt they would make a mistake of this nature. Call me crazy though, but these guys actually seem like they want to ("GASP") make money.

Angelicon, on 27 June 2012 - 06:58 AM, said:

That's silly -- there would be ZERO point to doubling armor -and- double weapon damage, because that just puts you back at original armor/damage ratios.
The devs have stated that they are doubling armor to make matches last longer. For that to be true they can't be doubling damage as well

Where was this said? Do you have a link to where a dev said they were doubling armor for a specific reason?

[donkeybas]

I think worrying about game balance based off some leaked footage and dev vids for a beta test is a bit premature.

[Kufu]

Wait and see

[zencynic]

Angelicon, on 27 June 2012 - 06:58 AM, said:

That's silly -- there would be ZERO point to doubling armor -and- double weapon damage, because that just puts you back at original armor/damage ratios.

No, there's actually a very good reason, one that I think I brought up briefly in another thread but never explained fully. If you double your armor and weapon values, it allows you greater flexibility in balancing without resorting to decimals or fractions.

Lets say the medium laser is too good at 5 damage. They try it at 4 damage and it blows. They could start messing around with RoF and other factors, but if they have larger values, they have more options.

Angelicon, on 27 June 2012 - 06:58 AM, said:

The devs have stated that they are doubling armor to make matches last longer. For that to be true they can't be doubling damage as well

Where/When did they say this?

[McNuggernauts]

Something everyone seems to be forgetting, you aren't going to be the only person shooting at someone all of the time.

[Easily]

Roguewolf, on 27 June 2012 - 07:01 AM, said:

Where was this said? Do you have a link to where a dev said they were doubling armor for a specific reason?

I too remember this quote. Been trying to find it on the forums here, but no such luck.
Will keep searching and post again once I find it.

[Allen B Caldwell]

I agree with the poster that recomended we see how it plays out when it releases. Damage may score differently than the PnP game so armor may need to be increased to compensate. Or Combat was over to fast so armor was doubled. All guesses till the game comes out. Patience my friends we will be meeting on the battle field soon enough, for now we drink...

[zencynic]

From Dev Blog 6 April 4, 2012

How is Armour going to be handled?

The way armour is being treated in MechWarrior Online is very similar to how it’s done in the tabletop game. That is, for every one ton of standard armour, the chassis is given 16 points of armor. These 16 points can be assigned to the various sections of a BattleMech. If the player purchases 8 tons of Armor for their BattleMech, they can assign 128 armour points throughout.
As per tabletop rules, each weight class of BattleMech has a maximum amount of armour it can sustain and this will be reflected in MechWarrior Online.
One last thing we will be carrying over from tabletop is the ability to distribute armour between the front and back torso of a BattleMech as well.

[shortpainter]

I wouldn't worry about this. My guess is that AC/20's do 40 damage and the double armor value is more of an accuracy thing than a total armor value thing. It is one of the trade offs all mechwarrior games have to make in order to be turned into a real time 3D game and its mostly due to the accuracy of lasers. We have all seen the lasers cut across several body parts of a mech in the videos. With double values, the damage is better represented just the same as doubling the resolution of your computer monitor makes a clearer picture.

Edited for Grammar

Edited by shortpainter, 27 June 2012 - 07:22 AM.