315 replies to this topic

[Calisrue]

Yknow the thing people are neglecting is IS FORCES ADAPT. is it such a big deal if a year from now there is a group of people (who have earned alot of c-bills prolly get the canonly superior clan tech? they haven't talked about how it will be implemented excactly but the thing is it will even out fairly quickly. if there is some initial uneveness, how does that differ from new content in any other online game? they can do things with cost, faction loyalty benefits, scarcity of resources to balance that haven't even been brought up, but if they are going for accurate canon, right of the bat clan mechs, pound for pound are gonna put a hurt on IS mechs of same skill. It turns around pretty fast from a historical point of view to parity

[Aethon]

Is it just me, or are some people completely ignoring every good point being made here?

"Clan mechs should be unable to be fully repaired between battles due to cost!"
Wrong. Put yourself in our shoes, and try to tell me that would not be obnoxious.

"Clan is always going to win due to superior tech!"
Wrong. As has been mentioned, there are ways of balancing this, and the devs have already demonstrated that they're not stupid.

"This is all going to be Clan vs. Clan!"
Wrong. Too many people love their IS machines for this to happen. For example, the Centurion is my favourite, even though it's an IS design, and most of my favourite Clan mechs are simply Clan upgrades of Star League-era IS designs, such as the IIC machines.

"A 100-ton Clan mech has to be even with a 100-ton IS mech!"
Wrong. Clan technology is about 100 years ahead of IS technology. You can't tell me that doesn't make a difference.

"The lore doesn't matter! This is only about gameplay!"
Wrong. This game is called 'Mechwarrior' for a reason. It's part of the Battletech universe. The lore is part of what makes Mechwarrior games what they are. This is a VERY slippery slope; Mektek, for example, didn't take very long to go from slight alterations to outright fabrications, when producing their expansions for MW4. If alterations to canon have to be made, it should be very carefully considered, and only carried out if there is no other way, or if it is a stopgap measure until a new bit of coding can be implemented to solve the problem in question. Throw away the lore, and you throw away the game.

I'm not opposed to innovation, and new ways of thinking; I *am* opposed to blatant, poorly-thought-out canon violations for no reason whatsoever. Nerfing Clan equipment just because a couple people want the technological diversity removed from the Battletech universe is just one such example. Take a good, look at the MechAssault series, and you'll see what I mean with the points mentioned above.

Edited by Aethon, 29 June 2012 - 11:11 PM.

[Alexander Diaz]

http://mwomercs.com/...118#entry486118

Some dude wrote this and it was like whoa .

At least compared to this 14 page topic.

Who reads this deep?

Try to but oft times, don't have the time.

[Xune]

Aethon, on 29 June 2012 - 11:08 PM, said:

Is it just me, or are some people completely ignoring every good point being made here?

"Clan mechs should be unable to be fully repaired between battles due to cost!"
Wrong. Put yourself in our shoes, and try to tell me that would not be obnoxious.

"Clan is always going to win due to superior tech!"
Wrong. As has been mentioned, there are ways of balancing this, and the devs have already demonstrated that they're not stupid.

"This is all going to be Clan vs. Clan!"
Wrong. Too many people love their IS machines for this to happen. For example, the Centurion is my favourite, even though it's an IS design, and most of my favourite Clan mechs are simply Clan upgrades of Star League-era IS designs, such as the IIC machines.

"A 100-ton Clan mech has to be even with a 100-ton IS mech!"
Wrong. Clan technology is about 300-400 years ahead of IS technology. You can't tell me that doesn't make a difference.

"The lore doesn't matter! This is only about gameplay!"
Wrong. This game is called 'Mechwarrior' for a reason. It's part of the Battletech universe. The lore is part of what makes Mechwarrior games what they are. This is a VERY slippery slope; Mektek, for example, didn't take very long to go from slight alterations to outright fabrications, when producing their expansions for MW4. If alterations to canon have to be made, it should be very carefully considered, and only carried out if there is no other way, or if it is a stopgap measure until a new bit of coding can be implemented to solve the problem in question. Throw away the lore, and you throw away the game.

I'm not opposed to innovation, and new ways of thinking; I *am* opposed to blatant, poorly-thought-out canon violations for no reason whatsoever. Nerfing Clan equipment just because a couple people want the technological diversity removed from the Battletech universe is just one such example. Take a good, look at the MechAssault series, and you'll see what I mean with the points mentioned above.

Right and on the clan side you get people who want to ignore the Lore and dont enforce Zellbringer and other rules ? How much of a different is this.


Most people say

IS= Clan (stupid in my opinion)
IS<Clan but enforce the freaking rules.


Clan people seem to be against anything that inhibits them, even ther very own rules tough

[Aethon]

Xune, on 29 June 2012 - 11:12 PM, said:

Right and on the clan side you get people who want to ignore the Lore and dont enforce Zellbringer and other rules ? How much of a different is this.


Most people say

IS= Clan (stupid in my opinion)
IS<Clan but enforce the freaking rules.


Clan people seem to be against anything that inhibits them, even ther very own rules tough

As has already been mentioned many times in this thread, you don't need to enforce zellbrigen when the Battle Value of all the units present is balanced.

Furthermore, after the initial conflicts, the Clans almost entirely dropped zellbrigen when fighting the IS, because they knew they were only hobbling themselves. It's like a championship boxer tying one hand behind his back with three new boxers out in front of him; he's not going to keep that hand behind his back if he knows they're not going to fight 1v1. The Clans aren't stupid; they fought, they lost, they learned, and they adapted.

This whole zellbrigen thing is going to come into play when Clan vs. Clan conflicts arise, or when trials are fought. In Clan vs. IS conflicts, you're not going to see it very often; when you do see it, the IS is going to violate it, and zell will go out the window within the first few seconds of the battle.

[Pacoua]

You might be able to upgrade quickly, but I'm sure there is going to be alot of gameplay that won't involve pvp. So it should still be fun for those that don't necessarily want to pay for the perks. I'm sure some of the more serious players will go full tilt with paying for perks so they will be given a boost to stay ahead of the game, but most people that play it casually won't be serious enough that it will matter. If you want a free ride you can go casual or complain all the time that a free game isn't fun because they can't be competitive with the hardcore. I don't think this should be a problem. I probably won't pay for the perks but I'm going casual with it anyway. If I pay it will be because I want to support a good game.

[Fire for Effect]

Landeraxe, on 29 June 2012 - 02:33 PM, said:

I suggest you think of it in two different stages;
Stage I (clan invasion; only clan has clan mechs/weapons), 10 clanners vs 12 IS mechs.
Stage II (clan tech/mechs available to IS players): 12 vs 12, open war (not just clan vs IS, but all vs all).

people still make the mistake of comparing numbers or mechs or tonnage instead of comparing battle point values...
BPV has worked quite well for the boardgame so there is no reason it should not work here...

Syro, on 29 June 2012 - 02:55 PM, said:

I certainly do not mean reducing the clans at all. Just getitng sorted out numerical balance (12 v 6? 5? 7?) and tweaking of weapon stats to make them more accurate/true to cannon/what have you, tuning mech models so they have the desired accel/turn/stop/height/cockpit/whatever. And yes, it would be fun to take shots at the dev during these tiny tuning raids.

ah yes RUSS your toast.... but again if you use BPV the numbers can be variable clanner brought only BPV heavy machines to the party? ok then they will be outnumbered. IS brought only assaults? well if the Clans bring only fast light BPV cheap units well the Clan might outnumber the IS

Rainrix, on 29 June 2012 - 09:44 PM, said:

Why don't clan mechs just be better, But for every 70 tons the Clan can bring, IS can bring 100 Tons. (Just a random number I guessed)

look at the BPV concept tonnage is nice but is 3025 when no advanced tech was available at that time tonnage was a very rough equalizer.
if you have very advanced Tech tonnage does not mean anything
Example:
just grabbed the old Mech Forch Combat Value list:

Atlas AS-7D 5371 points
Atlas AS-7D (C) 5706 points

It is the same mech only difference IS weapons changed for Clan variants roughly 6% more combat potential
now lets look at some archtypical Clan Mech built from scratch with Clan Tech

Mad Cat A 6330 points (remember only 75 tons...)
Marauder 3R 3556 points (also 75 tons same weight Class as the Mad Cat A also same Job on the battlefield)

Mad Cat A has a combat advantage of roughly 15 percent compared to an Atlas AS-7D...
and you need almost 2 Marauder to be equal to one Mad Cat A...

Any Comparision except by a Point system based on combat Potential is mood and useless. the Clan Mad Cat A would mop up the Floor with a single AS-7D if the pilots are at least equal.

Rejarial Galatan, on 29 June 2012 - 09:52 PM, said:

turning down the power of clans is IS easy button. Making Clanners pay more to field the tech is easy button for IS. Making it hard for us in the clans is: Making us fight superior numbers. 2 to 1, 3 to 1, 4 to 1. While, we may have the superior tech, we, in the end, will lose and be forced into a truce for 15 years.

Again you do not need a Mech by Mech equalization it is enough if the teams are roughly equal... your only chance to win against clans is team play.... if you are a sociopathic lone wolf (or rather Jade Falcon...) player then you are right for the Clan side. That is their pilot material granted with superior reflexes but still not the buddy lets drink a beer type

Xune, on 29 June 2012 - 10:49 PM, said:

2: Breaking Zellbringer does compleatly negate all benefits a player could get from that match. So no planet capture, no exp, no money.

3: If a claner does (on purpose) Keep firig on Targets already engaged by a nother Player he will get a "timeout" in which he cant use his mech, trying to simulate the time he is going to spend in the hospital after being beaten half death from some one in the cycle for being the punk he is.

Xune

Unlikely to happen since there are always idiots who would just do that on purpose just to spoil the fun for others apart from that only the most traditional Clans would stick to their rigid combat philosophies after seeing the standard IS practice of ganging up against a single opponent...
Normaly if the enemy breaks their rules of engagement (only direct duels) everything was off and open to free fire at anything.

[exiledangel]

what about doubling points for clan kills when fighting IS vs clan and normal points fighting clan vs clan

[Widghet]

My thoughts on clan mechs is this. Have the clanners, when they first appear, be NPCed "random" attackers so sometimes when you queue for a match, you get a star of NPC clanners. Depending on how quickly they advance the timeline, they can start allowing some clan mechs be pilotable by players as "salvaged" mechs and at the same time, start releasing IS tech that is on par, showing the IS research into the tech through reverse engineering. This will prevent the "OP" players who play clan mechs, while still introducing them in a cannon manor. I think this is a viable and doable way to do it.

[Rejarial Galatan]

Xune: I am not against penalties for rule breaking, but, I am against wholesale shutting down of XP/C-Bill rewards to the players of the Clans in a fight if someone does something stupid. People who say: Enforce the Zellbrigen, do not get the fact that, the moment dishonorable intent is suspected, the Zell takes a back seat. Also, since a Trueborn Clan warrior knows that a freebirth is trash and not worthy to pilot a battlemech, they do not feel the need, and are NOT required to up hold the rights, honor and tradition of Zellbrigen. The ONLY time the Zellbrigen can be enforced is when the fight is say: Clan Wolf against Jade Falcon, or Falcon against Smoke Jaguar, only then can the Zell be truly enforced.

[MechPorn]

Easy way to fix the issue:

Make it a bidding drop. Each person bids their lowest tonnage into a drop, the lower you go, the more XP you get. The higher the tonnage the less XP and cash/honor you get.

Being Clan, you will more than likely have to face 2X the amount of tonnage that you bring.

[Stahl Krieger]

Lightdragon, on 28 June 2012 - 04:32 PM, said:

...or we could just not have clans, all the clans attract is people with god complexes, horrible roleplayers, and ignorant noobs that dont even bother to read up on the history of the bt universe

I resent that. Just because one of my favourite Mechs is the Mad Cat does not necessarily mean that I have some negative trait that you listed.

[William McNab]

BFalcon, on 28 June 2012 - 05:57 PM, said:

Fair enough - I'm cursed with a long memory for useless junk that I don't want to remember. Anything useful and... forget it.

And no offense taken...

(And I'm 39 and still read them from time to time)

46 and have the full novel collection including Battletech, Mechwarrior, and Battletech Dark Ages, with the exception of the novels my kids trashed, LOL.

[Grugore]

RoyalWave, on 28 June 2012 - 05:37 PM, said:

Because balance involves equal chance for both sides, minimizing RPG qualities like grinding for better gear. If I play 10000 hours, okay I might get some mech XP unlock bonuses which are minimal, 4% faster turning etc, but giving me a whole new class of mech (clan tech) that is just better by magnitudes over IS? That's the definition of imbalance. The Clans are the like, clear cut canon overpowered faction. Translating that to a video game, no matter what out of game drawbacks or grind or payments you attach, you still end up with an overpowered faction.

The problem is only solved by making IS mechs on par wtih clan mechs in power.

Listen I don't mind switching an alt to clan if they are overpowered, but I'd just rather not.

IMHO, Balance is the worst thing you could do! Don't nerf anything. If you do that, there's no point to introducing the Clans in the first place. They wouldn't BE the Clan. I'm sure the Devs have a good idea to handle the whole thing, and I can't wait to see how they do it.

[Rorik Thrumsalr]

Exactly. If you make the clan tech on par with IS tech then their entire existence is moot. They were made to be an almost impossoble threat for the individual successor states to counter while divided.

On a similar note this makes me feel nostalgic. Anyone remember escaping a Clan Wolf detention camp in a pegasus hover tank?

[Reoh]

I think it would be helpful if we all looked at this from another angle. Let's consider some core gameplay fundamentals, and put faction \ tech aside for the moment. Can we agree on the following?:

All Players should have equal capacity to be rewarded for their participation.

All Teams should be balanced so that they have an approximate equivalence of Battle Value.*

* Battle Value (BV) is a long-standing canonical system for comparing 'Mechs in the BTverse.

Any match-making system used should aim to achieve these two goals. This holds true regardless of which factions are involved and what technology their Mechwarriors have available. While I concede that having fair matches where either team can win isn't true of every battle fought (in BT or IRL), an allowance should be made for the prosperity of MWO. It serves no purpose to craft a game where players are purposefully disadvantaged in regards to their capacity to play game matches.

Ripper vtol brought up a good point in regards to how mech selection could affect a team's BV if players could choose their mechs after a randomly selected map. The only counter to this would be to select your mech before queueing, and consequently not permitting tailoring or reselecting your ride after a map was known. I wish it were otherwise and if anybody can suggest a favorable alternative that permits 'Mech selection in some sort of Pre-match lobby while maintaining a BV-balance I would be happy to hear it. My only recommendation here would be to have team viewable selection and lock mechanics, with a blindspot for what your opponent's were choosing. This would help simulate the randomness of confrontations (yet still provide BV mechanics for a fighting chance).

...

Having made those points, I would now like to address some of the recurrent themes being posted in this discussion.

Nerf ClanTech!
Rather than trying to balance factions on a mech to mech basis, I would prefer a counter-balance approach that maintains canonical flavor while also offering equal prospects of victory. Even if Clan tech was identical to IS tech, we will still be piloting different chasis with different hitboxes. We could go with one of the creative Clan tech diffusion suggestions but there would still be adoption lag for new players, and availability or fiscal penalties would violate the first premise I suggested above. If we all end up piloting clan mechs, then all the work invested in the IS gear would be wasted effort (for players & developer alike). Besides, some of us want to pilot and fight for the Inner-Sphere.

IS should outnumber Clanners!
Rooted in the canon is the counter-balance mechanic of the IS using their numerical superiority to counter the Clans technological distinctiveness. While the argument has merit, I was even in favor of it previously, it is an imperfect solution. IS v IS and Clan v Clan matches still occur, and using participant numbers fails to balance team composition. Other metrics such as the costs or tonnage of mechs are not always adequate comparisons for the battlefield. BV on the other hand was tailored to be the best representation of combat effectiveness to overcome the drawbacks of the previous options. Its not flawless, but it is the least flawed.

Clans are supposed to dominate the IS!
I am sure there are people on both sides that would enjoy reliving the campaign, seeing it with their own eyes as it were. However I'm compelled to point out that this would mean both sides of the conflict would not have an equal opportunity to win. MWO is a game, and the majority of people play games for fun. Yes, its true the IS could overcome the Clan's advantages; it even happened in lore a few times (in the initial invasion). The majority of battles were however crushing defeats. I would fear for the longevitiy of the game if such an approach was taken, and feel confident PGI will never do this. While they have admirably held to canon in many areas of the game, they also don't delete your account when your mechwarrior pilot should have died. They've also doubled armor values to help balance the random\fps aim difference, and even still there are people complaining fights are over too quickly. Some allowances have and will continue to be made.

X side just wants an easy button!
Perhaps some do, but there are many other valid reasons for choosing a given side. All I'm calling for is an even button.

[edit]

Forgot about...

Zel will save us!
There's one giant plot hole here, the Zel rules specifically state they can be abandoned when fighting the IS which negates its affect on cross-factional balance. Many of the proposals suggested are susceptable to trolling by one or the other side involved in the match. Others impose severe in-game restrictions to enforce compliance, but simple mistakes could result in harsh penalties that discourage players from enjoying the game. Finally as an IS pilot I see little reason to play at a disadvantage to uphold Clan honor, if the system is going to be ignored then it fails to achieve the desired effect.

Edited by Reoh, 01 July 2012 - 12:04 AM.

[BoomerZ]

Skringly, on 28 June 2012 - 04:49 PM, said:

There is some truth in it though...

Errrmm...........

[BoomerZ]

Lore
Prevent the activation of one Faction from scrapping other Factions

[Salvasian]

I reckon that the best way to balance it would be team size. Clans operate in stars of 5 mechs, with a binary being 2 stars (i.e. 12 mechs vs 10)

*Note: Apologies if someone has already raised this, but thread so long that haven't finished yet.

Edited by Salvasian, 01 July 2012 - 01:21 AM.

[BlazeKaiser]

Why wasnt this topic just burned down after the OP?

the Starter doesnt seem to understand that clan tech is more advanced for good reason.

You want example. IS lost the ability to construct most mechs, technology, etc from about 2760 to 3040. Clan didnt and upgraded.

Old mechs like the Marauder, Warhammer, and Orion were upgraded with more compact forms of XL engines, Ferro Fibrous armor, and Endo Steel chassis. Weapons were made more compact and lighter, lasers had greater focusing pieces to have longer range and damage.
----------------
Nerfing clan tech isnt the answer. I suggested that rather than people starting as clanners they would need to join as Bondsmen somehow, so no "noob" clanners wrecking the game.

In Mech VS mech fights, IS would have greater numbers, 12-10 as people have pointed out.

Edited by BlazeKaiser, 01 July 2012 - 02:55 AM.