20517 replies to this topic

[TheArisen]

SuperFunkTron, on 23 April 2019 - 09:09 AM, said:

That's why I am confused. It seems like such a clear choice but it is ignored for less functional options that don't bring nearly as much to the table.

Pouncer has gotten a good bit of support from what I've seen but there hasn't been a thread talking about mech additions recently.

[Bishop Steiner]

FupDup, on 23 April 2019 - 03:21 PM, said:

I've long maintained that PGI should do a community poll to see how they'd want IS Omnis implemented. Either create non-canon enhanced "Mk. II" versions with Endo, DHS, etc., add godquirks, or only focus on the "good" ones like the Raptor.

Or just finally buff the IS XL's durability (I prefer giving it side torso HP to equal that of the CT while keeping the ST death mechanic for flavor).



If the BJ-O had similar hitboxes/geometry as the normal BJ then it being XL viable would already be guarenteed because in my brief experience using a Blackjack the thing's CT tended to be a damage magnet (but it's also possible that I'm a baddie). Its real issue is being a 64-kph medium without really gaining much firepower to show for it.

twin AC10 is pretty potent firepower for a 45 tonner. But it is still slow, for sure, even with JJs. 28.5 tons of pod space is on par with the Timby or Mad Dog, even if IS weapons are generally not as weight efficient. But still, admittedly speculation, nothing more.

[FupDup]

Bishop Steiner, on 23 April 2019 - 05:59 PM, said:

twin AC10 is pretty potent firepower for a 45 tonner. But it is still slow, for sure, even with JJs. 28.5 tons of pod space is on par with the Timby or Mad Dog, even if IS weapons are generally not as weight efficient. But still, admittedly speculation, nothing more.

You're only gonna get 1.5 tons of ammo with that double AC/10 setup, barring armor stripping. Also note the lack of slots (it's supposed to have 1 slot open in the CT but I put a dash there by accident a long time ago and never bothered to correct it yet).

Edited by FupDup, 23 April 2019 - 06:02 PM.

[TheArisen]

FupDup, on 23 April 2019 - 03:21 PM, said:

I've long maintained that PGI should do a community poll to see how they'd want IS Omnis implemented. Either create non-canon enhanced "Mk. II" versions with Endo, DHS, etc., add godquirks, or only focus on the "good" ones like the Raptor.

Or just finally buff the IS XL's durability (I prefer giving it side torso HP to equal that of the CT while keeping the ST death mechanic for flavor).



If the BJ-O had similar hitboxes/geometry as the normal BJ then it being XL viable would already be guarenteed because in my brief experience using a Blackjack the thing's CT tended to be a damage magnet (but it's also possible that I'm a baddie). Its real issue is being a 64-kph medium without really gaining much firepower to show for it.

I'd go for the MK. II version &/or focus on good ones first.

Men Shen being another good IS omni and I'd say the Black Hawk-Ku as well.

[Sereglach]

For the Pouncer, I think the Clans do need a good 40t "Trooper mech" . . . although my personal preference is the Griffin IIC. The Pouncer might be a nice 40t Trooper Omni and the Griffin IIC a Trooper Battlemech. I'm all for both . . . they need more lighter mediums, anyway.

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For IS Omnis I think it's fascinating that when Chris Lowrey was brought on board one of the first things he mentioned, as a personal desire, was wanting to tackle IS vs. Clan XL durability balance (of which Paul and Russ said they didn't want to upset the "good balance" they had between the factions . . . even though they hired Chris to help address the admittedly poor balance they acknowledged as a problem . . . go figure). Maybe PGI will finally get around to addressing it when IS Omnis become inevitable.

I think the best solution is make IS XL the current 60% performance loss that Clan XLs have, and then drop the Clan XL and IS LFE down to the 40% that the Clan XL originally had. 20% performance loss per crit slot destroyed seems fair; and you can leave both ST = death in place for all XL. Save the single ST loss = death for the eventual XXL engines. That way, with a virtual snap of a finger, nearly all IS Omnis become at least half-decent out of the gate and much less reliant on super-quirks to save them; and at the same time bridging what is likely the biggest gap in inhibiting inter-faction balance.

[Odanan]

Sereglach, on 23 April 2019 - 07:23 PM, said:

For the Pouncer, I think the Clans do need a good 40t "Trooper mech" . . . although my personal preference is the Griffin IIC. The Pouncer might be a nice 40t Trooper Omni and the Griffin IIC a Trooper Battlemech. I'm all for both . . . they need more lighter mediums, anyway.

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For IS Omnis I think it's fascinating that when Chris Lowrey was brought on board one of the first things he mentioned, as a personal desire, was wanting to tackle IS vs. Clan XL durability balance (of which Paul and Russ said they didn't want to upset the "good balance" they had between the factions . . . even though they hired Chris to help address the admittedly poor balance they acknowledged as a problem . . . go figure). Maybe PGI will finally get around to addressing it when IS Omnis become inevitable.

I think the best solution is make IS XL the current 60% performance loss that Clan XLs have, and then drop the Clan XL and IS LFE down to the 40% that the Clan XL originally had. 20% performance loss per crit slot destroyed seems fair; and you can leave both ST = death in place for all XL. Save the single ST loss = death for the eventual XXL engines. That way, with a virtual snap of a finger, nearly all IS Omnis become at least half-decent out of the gate and much less reliant on super-quirks to save them; and at the same time bridging what is likely the biggest gap in inhibiting inter-faction balance.

There is already a 40 tonner battlemech for the Clans (Arctic Wolf), so I think the Pouncer is a better choice.

About the IS XL Engine, I like your suggestion a lot.


That would open opportunity for a very cool IS Omni pack, with Raptor, Men Shen, Avatar and Templar.

[TheArisen]

Odanan, on 24 April 2019 - 05:41 AM, said:

There is already a 40 tonner battlemech for the Clans (Arctic Wolf), so I think the Pouncer is a better choice.

About the IS XL Engine, I like your suggestion a lot.


That would open opportunity for a very cool IS Omni pack, with Raptor, Men Shen, Avatar and Templar.

Well technically the AW is both battlemech & omni as it has variants for both.

[Bishop Steiner]

I'd be down with finishing up the classics too, for MW5, though I still feel it's foolish for them to not be releasing any exclusive designs with MW5. Sales lost. Exclusive designs always add sales. And THEN release hem to MWO after. *sigh*

[Sereglach]

Odanan, on 24 April 2019 - 05:41 AM, said:

There is already a 40 tonner battlemech for the Clans (Arctic Wolf), so I think the Pouncer is a better choice.

As already stated, the Arctic Wolf is hybrid between Omni and Battlemech. On top of that, unlike the Griffin IIC, the Arctic Wolf's Battlemech variants are almost exclusively raw missile variants. The Griffin IIC is much more of a flexible hardpoint platform, and with a lower base speed, it'll likely end up with more of a trooper focus than the Arctic Wolf due to a lower max engine cap. I'd say the Arctic Wolf is a skirmisher more than any sort of Trooper mech.

[Pariah Devalis]

Odanan, on 23 April 2019 - 11:31 AM, said:

And the most important information, the speed: 97.2 km/h. So, a smaller and slightly faster Nova? Not bad at all.

That's the thing. People take one look at the Pouncer's aesthetics and think LARGER ADDER. But look at its omnipods and hardwired equipment. It is not a larger Adder. It is a lighter Nova. Up to, what, 11 energy hardpoints, a pair of external HW DHS, and jump jets? Totally a mini-Nova.

And that is OK.

Edited by Pariah Devalis, 24 April 2019 - 03:56 PM.

[FupDup]

Pariah Devalis, on 24 April 2019 - 03:54 PM, said:

That's the thing. People take one look at the Pouncer's aesthetics and think LARGER ADDER. But look at its omnipods and hardwired equipment. It is not a larger Adder. It is a lighter Nova. Up to, what, 11 energy hardpoints, a pair of external HW DHS, and jump jets? Totally a mini-Nova.

And that is OK.

Somebody needs to make a meme of an Adder and Nova doing the fusion dance to become the Pouncer.

[FLG 01]

Pariah Devalis, on 24 April 2019 - 03:54 PM, said:

That's the thing. People take one look at the Pouncer's aesthetics and think LARGER ADDER. But look at its omnipods and hardwired equipment. It is not a larger Adder. It is a lighter Nova. Up to, what, 11 energy hardpoints, a pair of external HW DHS, and jump jets? Totally a mini-Nova.

That's true.

I just would not discount the larger Adder concept, though. The Adder's primary problem is the combination of geometry and relatively low speed. Everybody can single out components; some players can do it with ease. From that point of view, the Pouncer just cannot be worse. But it can be better as it carries more armour, sports JJ, and either runs cooler iirc (PPC builds) or, as you said, carries more weapons.

It would depend a bit on quirks, and as the Marauder II illustrated yet once more you cannot rely on the hope for good quirks. However, as long as PGI does not kill the agility, it might be doing well.

[Pariah Devalis]

FLG 01, on 24 April 2019 - 06:15 PM, said:

That's true.

I just would not discount the larger Adder concept, though. The Adder's primary problem is the combination of geometry and relatively low speed. Everybody can single out components; some players can do it with ease. From that point of view, the Pouncer just cannot be worse. But it can be better as it carries more armour, sports JJ, and either runs cooler iirc (PPC builds) or, as you said, carries more weapons.

It would depend a bit on quirks, and as the Marauder II illustrated yet once more you cannot rely on the hope for good quirks. However, as long as PGI does not kill the agility, it might be doing well.

40 tons makes it "lightest in class," and jump jets work extremely well on mediums. Safe bet the sucker would get plenty of ups, so from a mobility standpoint it's solid. From a speed standpoint, it'll be breaking 100 KPH unless you don't invest in speed tweak which, in a 40-ton mech, is a questionable survival decision. It could be worse there, for sure.


But you're right. If viewed from an aesthetics/geometry standpoint, alone, it is very Adder-y. Jump jets should mitigate some of the issues inherent from that design. I, for one, prefer to view the mech from a hardware and combat lethality standpoint, however. On the inside, it is totally a uNova. At the very least, it would be able to fill the role of energy based low-end-medium striker that the Viper's pod-space issues disallow and the Arctic Wolf's hardpoints don't fully capitalize upon.

On a semi-related note:

At this point, I think I'd actually want to see the Turkina in the game. Yeah, it is a lighter weight Dire Wolf with less pod space, but at least it would be a Clan 95 ton mech that can actually, ya know... throw a punch?

Edited by Pariah Devalis, 24 April 2019 - 07:59 PM.

[Bishop Steiner]

Pariah Devalis, on 24 April 2019 - 07:57 PM, said:

40 tons makes it "lightest in class," and jump jets work extremely well on mediums. Safe bet the sucker would get plenty of ups, so from a mobility standpoint it's solid. From a speed standpoint, it'll be breaking 100 KPH unless you don't invest in speed tweak which, in a 40-ton mech, is a questionable survival decision. It could be worse there, for sure.


But you're right. If viewed from an aesthetics/geometry standpoint, alone, it is very Adder-y. Jump jets should mitigate some of the issues inherent from that design. I, for one, prefer to view the mech from a hardware and combat lethality standpoint, however. On the inside, it is totally a uNova. At the very least, it would be able to fill the role of energy based low-end-medium striker that the Viper's pod-space issues disallow and the Arctic Wolf's hardpoints don't fully capitalize upon.

On a semi-related note:

At this point, I think I'd actually want to see the Turkina in the game. Yeah, it is a lighter weight Dire Wolf with less pod space, but at least it would be a Clan 95 ton mech that can actually, ya know... throw a punch?

At this point, is there anything, IS or Clan, left that actually brings anything new to the table? Or are we pretty much to the point of quibbling for geometry and aesthetic/nostalgia biases?

[FupDup]

Bishop Steiner, on 28 April 2019 - 09:22 AM, said:

At this point, is there anything, IS or Clan, left that actually brings anything new to the table? Or are we pretty much to the point of quibbling for geometry and aesthetic/nostalgia biases?

Well, the Raptor, Kommodo, and Black Hawk KU would give the IS some real options to mass-spam small and medium lasers.

IS Omnimechs in general would offer a new building puzzle to work with.

The Black Python would give the Clams a 75-ton laser boat.

Canis would give the Clams an 80-ton assault with high torso mounts (basically all 80-tonners now have low or mid mounts).

Clams still need Battlemechs in several weight brackets.

The Kingfisher, Stooping Hawk, and Battle Cobra would give the Clams some STD engine Omnis (more relevant because of the side torso penalty nerf).

Etc...


TL;DR: Yeah basically I can think of a few holes left to fill.

[TheArisen]

Bishop Steiner, on 28 April 2019 - 09:22 AM, said:

At this point, is there anything, IS or Clan, left that actually brings anything new to the table? Or are we pretty much to the point of quibbling for geometry and aesthetic/nostalgia biases?

IS 20 to 25 ton with JJ (Like the Brigand & Wasp/Stinger)

IS 85 tonner with JJ, Gunslinger, it's also got the ballistics & ecm.

IS omnis offers lots of options

As Fup said, Raptor, Komodo & Black Hawk-Ku offer true med & small laser boating. We could add the Flashman (9M has 10E) & Sagittaire as well.

[Jay Leon Hart]

FupDup, on 28 April 2019 - 09:30 AM, said:

Well, the Raptor, Kommodo, and Black Hawk KU would give the IS some real options to mass-spam small and medium lasers.

TheArisen, on 28 April 2019 - 12:12 PM, said:

As Fup said, Raptor, Komodo & Black Hawk-Ku offer true med & small laser boating.

Oh what a glorious day that would be!

[Odanan]

TheArisen, on 28 April 2019 - 12:12 PM, said:

IS 20 to 25 ton with JJ (Like the Brigand & Wasp/Stinger)
IS 85 tonner with JJ, Gunslinger, it's also got the ballistics & ecm.
IS omnis offers lots of options

This. ^

[Odanan]

IS 20 tons with jump: Wasp/Stinger.
IS 25 tons with jump AND great omni: Raptor.
IS 55 tons great omni: Men Shen.
IS 65 tons: Crusader, because Crusader.
IS 85 tons with jump: Gunslinger would be great. With a change to the IS XL Engines, enter the MW4 IS omnimechs: Avatar and Templar.

Clan 20 tons with jump and ECM: Firemoth.
Clan 25 tons omni with podspace: Fire Falcon.
Clan 100 tons: Stone Rhino, because Stone Rhino.

So, IS gets the 2 remaining Unseens (Wasp and Crusader) and an omnimech 4-mech pack. Clans get some essentials.

/MWO

[FupDup]

Odanan, on 28 April 2019 - 04:52 PM, said:

With a change to the IS XL Engines, enter the MW4 IS omnimechs: Avatar and Templar.

I'd classify the Avatar as an MW3 mech because it was only added to MW4 by MekTek's MekPaks years after the official release.