191 replies to this topic

[Metus regem]

Amsro, on 10 March 2015 - 12:46 PM, said:

Good tactics win matches.

I do like to take 2 King Crabs in my CW drop deck, but with only 50 tons left over for 2 more mechs, your options dwindle quickly.

Locust + Spider
Commado + Commando

Thats about it.

Well at the time, my IS stable consisted of the fallowing:

Locust 1V
Locust 1E
CN9-A (c)
CN9-D
CN9-LYW
AS7-S(L)
KGC-000(L)

Guess I could've gone Atlas and KGC with dual Locusts at the time but I felt stronger taking the Centurions.

[Aiden Skye]

People still think clan mechs are unbeatable? Especially in this brawl heavy meta where IS has much better burst damage, run cooler, with shorter duration lasers. Bads will just be bads I guess, no matter how many handouts are giving out, the cries just won't ever end.

[COOL HANDS]

How can I describe what it's like for IS players in the current meta delicately ......... well?





Clanner's don't want their mechs nerfed but in the same breath they also don't want the IS mechs brought into full balance with the clan mechs so they can at least be competitive. I don't know man, it's a lose lose situation for IS pilots no matter how you slice it. .

Edited by xxXKryotech OneXxx, 10 March 2015 - 01:08 PM.

[Amsro]

W A R K H A N, on 10 March 2015 - 12:52 PM, said:

People still think clan mechs are unbeatable? Especially in this brawl heavy meta where IS has much better burst damage, run cooler, with shorter duration lasers. Bads will just be bads I guess, no matter how many handouts are giving out, the cries just won't ever end.

Yes because XL engine clan mechs are terribly easy to kill/disarm. Oh wait!

Tell me the IS drop deck that ton for ton is better then the best Clan drop deck.

IS benefits
-Cooler Energy
-Better AC (except Gauss)
-Shorter Duration Enery

Clan benefits
-Less tonnage per weapon
-XL with no side torso death (need to take both)
-Longer Range

ton for ton good Clan mechs are better then good IS mechs

75 ton - Orion or MadCat
65 ton - Thunderbolt/Jagermech or Hellbringer
55 ton - Griffin/Shadowhawk/Kintaro/Wolverine or Stormcrow

Does this mean they can't be killed, obviously not, but there is little denying the good clan mechs are pretty much the best mechs in the game currently.

Edited by Amsro, 10 March 2015 - 04:19 PM.

[charov]

Clan weapons weight less, but clan mechs also have embarrassing space available. Shall we talk about the gargoyle or the summoner?

If you want to use numbers fine, but don't look only at what helps you in this discussion.

Quick example: there are almost no clan mechs than can mount 2x gauss even if they weight 6t less. If you don't play clans you'll never understand how frustrating can be building a mech with 12t of hardwired suboptimal stuff and an oversized engine (executioner).

[Nori Silverrage]

red devil2, on 10 March 2015 - 01:27 PM, said:

Quick example: there are almost no clan mechs than can mount 2x gauss even if they weight 6t less. If you don't play clans you'll never understand how frustrating can be building a mech with 12t of hardwired suboptimal stuff and an oversized engine (executioner).

Yeah I don't think people mention this enough. There is no clan mech that can effectively fit two gauss outside of the dire. The Warhawk can but it wastes it's heatsinks, Timber gets close, but you would have no backup weapons or ammo. However, there are at least two heavy IS that can mount two.

Someone mentioned the Orion vs the Timber. To be honest they have very similar firepower, Timber would get a slight range bonus and speed, but the Orion would get a nice PPD balistic and some low duration lasers. Seems like a good tradeoff to me.

[BARBAR0SSA]

Jonny Slam, on 09 March 2015 - 05:03 PM, said:

I had almost a months break and have been back shooting for a few days,.........

You should go duel someone that knows IS mech quirks well while you're in a clan mech. I have a feeling it will change.

Amsro, on 10 March 2015 - 01:08 PM, said:

ton for ton good Clan mechs are better then good IS mechs

75 ton - Orion or MadCat
60 ton - Catapult/Quickdraw or Hellbringer
55 ton - Griffin/Shadowhawk/Kintaro/Wolverine or Stormcrow

Does this mean they can't be killed, obviously not, but there is little denying the good clan mechs are pretty much the best mechs in the game currently.

Building a 240T drop deck you aren't forced to take an Orion, you can switch mechs to bring something like a Stalker 4N that's got insane DPS.

55T You underestimate the wolverine 6k...big time, I love that mech.

Why did you leave out the 25T, 30T, 35T, 45T, 50T range? Firestarter makes the adder look like a 5T mech, Jenner makes it look like a 15T.

Also nice try, but Hellbringer is 65T. So lets see 330M I'd pick Wubolt 5ss, Boreal? 9s ERPPC or 5ss ERLL

60T Mad dog or Dragon 1N? 1N so so bad

45T Ice Ferret or BlackJack? Blackjack....yeah no test here



Direwolf can be completely and utterly destroyed by a spider/locust/jenner/firestarter without taking damage. Where as an Atlas can at least get some shots in on a myst lynx or ice ferret

Edited by shad0w4life, 10 March 2015 - 02:07 PM.

[Grimvid]

Two groups that continue to talk pass each other.

The "who do you want to play group" story.

The giant hero barbarian axeman, mowing down the brave palace guard, singing to his pagan gods with every swing. A beautiful large bosum woman stands across the room with great tankards of ale in each hand.
The stalwart palace guardsman, holding the line before the frighting mountion of muscled terror advancing his way. The terrors every swing brings froth a spray of blood splashing over him. His dagger slips from an unfeeling hand as his sword shakes within the other--boots filling with warm fluid. His turn comes as the as the axe falls; stepped on--stepped over. As the honorable footman passes from cruel fate and even crueler wounds, upon his ears comes the sound of tearing cloth and quaffing of liquid.

Who do you want to be: the hero axeman or the palace guardsman?

The historical Group story.

Hey, it's great to take on a tiger with 5 shermans.

Possible solution:

Make a lore-based ultra clan mad CW.

[Red1769]

red devil2, on 10 March 2015 - 01:27 PM, said:

Clan weapons weight less, but clan mechs also have embarrassing space available. Shall we talk about the gargoyle or the summoner?

If you want to use numbers fine, but don't look only at what helps you in this discussion.

Quick example: there are almost no clan mechs than can mount 2x gauss even if they weight 6t less. If you don't play clans you'll never understand how frustrating can be building a mech with 12t of hardwired suboptimal stuff and an oversized engine (executioner).

Just to clarify this point, only the Dire Wolf can Duel Gauss effectively for the Clans. But lacks agility and speed. But yes, pretty much.

Edited by Red1769, 10 March 2015 - 02:04 PM.

[charov]

Red1769, on 10 March 2015 - 02:01 PM, said:

Just to clarify this point, only the Dire Wolf can Duel Gauss effectively for the Clans. But lacks agility and speed. But yes, pretty much.

Yet you see tons of whiners against it. I agree that it was too powerful when ppc and gr could be fired together and had the same speed, but now does not make any sense! Btw, the same ppl that cries against the Whale don't complain for the dual gauss jagermech, even if it can do the same amount of pinpoint damage while weighting 1/3 less. Can you imagine why? And no, it's not because the whale mounts additional weapons..

[Gyrok]

Jonny Slam, on 09 March 2015 - 05:03 PM, said:

I had almost a months break and have been back shooting for a few days, and it's abundantly clear that the game has slanted towards the clans too much. The clan mechs are more powerful, especially the mids and heavies, so naturally more pilots are now going clan. Which makes the pilot base population of the clans more powerful as well. Which unbalances CW with waves and waves of clanners.

Keep in mind that I'm not blaming the Clan pilots, it's fun to have the more powerful weapons and mechs, so why wouldn't you join the clans and fight with clan mechs? it's a game so your supposed to have fun. Makes sense, and I have no beef with clan pilots or their growing numbers.

Now that many players have the option to buy clan mechs with C-bills the slant is accelerating.

I suppose PGI must have known this was coming when they went 12 VS 12, instead of lances VS stars. Too bad really it's just made the balance untenable. I am aware of why Russ and the gang said they couldn't go stars, because of the cost of development and such. Yet because they shied away from making it happen they have crippled their own product. And the players game, shame really.

Those guys back in the old days of BT really knew what they were doing didn't they? It's exciting to introduce more powerful adversaries to the game universe, it stimulates growth and excellent game play. But they were even more wise to know that it had to be balanced by smaller numbers.

I suppose the reason the Quirks continue to fail is pretty simple, Clans get upset when a inner sphere mech or weapon is as powerful or more so then what they are using. They didn't sign up for that, and I tend to agree, they chose to be on the clan not the IS team. Then when Russ and Co. slant it back to the clans in power as was done recently it upsets the IS, because fighting EQUAL numbers of more powerful mechs is not what they signed up for.

Russ, you have to sort this out if you want this game to grow.

Read these posts about mech builds:

http://mwomercs.com/...k/page__st__100

[Red1769]

red devil2, on 10 March 2015 - 02:40 PM, said:

Yet you see tons of whiners against it. I agree that it was too powerful when ppc and gr could be fired together and had the same speed, but now does not make any sense! Btw, the same ppl that cries against the Whale don't complain for the dual gauss jagermech, even if it can do the same amount of pinpoint damage while weighting 1/3 less. Can you imagine why? And no, it's not because the whale mounts additional weapons..

At one point, I think they did (and to expand, it is faster, but also more fragile than the Daishi. *looks at the AC40 Jager* Those too.), along with the Splatcat, boomkat, Poptarts, and any other "meta" thing. But once the King Crab hit, I think it stopped being about that particular build, since the IS could do it too then (or was it the nerf first? I don't remember. Either way, the Crab is the IS's response to the Whale). The PPCs in general got hit a little too hard in my opinion with the nerf bat, though, and aren't worth putting them on except on quirked mechs. It's just going to be an endless cycle whining, it'll just be the next big thing. Not saying the TBR and SCR don't need a tad bit of tuning or that some of it isn't warranted...I just think a lot of it is blown out of proportion and it's not as bad as what some people think it is.

Just for reference, I do have a dual guass Dire...but it also has dual erlls and an lrm15 rack (my White Whale with matching paintjob ). I only really have the lrm 15 to hit people/harass them when I'm still catching up/getting to the battle line.

The Clans are just the new boogeyman to complain about, some of it warranted some not so much. Some people have an endless vendetta against them and won't quit until they're just completely removed. Some are realists and see the advantages and disadvanges of both sides, but still awknowledge that the Clans MIGHT have a slight edge, some just want the them to obsolete the IS completely (though are few and far between and often castrated by the other two sides).

I did small analysis on another such thread as this one...and reflected some of it earlier in this one. Right now, I'm more of the wait and see on the Clan quirkening and letting the IS gets settled with their own.

[Insidious Johnson]

I've heard the dev excuse that 12v10 drops iz 2 codehard for thems! Simple, script in 2 suiciding AI pilots on any team created for clan side before humans can be invited in 12v12 . Just use the regular AI Paul was working on. Same thing. Be sure and call them Russ and Paul, for clarity. That'll be $120,000. Standard consultation fee, kthnxbai.

[Soy]

I always said this:

http://mwomercs.com/...ost__p__2322324

Steel and others eventually supported it:

http://mwomercs.com/...ost__p__2547189

God dammit I still think it would've been the best thing ever! xD

[ROSS-128]

I'm sure coding it would actually be pretty easy (at least for CW, solo queue would be a nightmare because you'd need to write an entirely new MM algorithm designed to balance 10 mechs against 12 with uneven weights).

The problem is that balancing it would be an absolute nightmare. If you change CW to 10v12 and then balance Clan mechs so that they're designed to win while outnumbered, the Clans will absolutely faceroll CW by having better mechs and more population at the same time.

Like, imagine you were making a WWII game with Russia vs Germany. And you made a giant campaign map that theoretically any number of players could join both sides. Then you balance the game so that 1 German is worth 2 Russians. The Russians and Germans have the same number of respawns, no logistics, and each player only puts 1 German or 1 Russian on the field no matter which faction he joins. So in order to achieve the 1:2 ratio, the Russians literally need 2 Russian players for every German player.

So then 1000 players join the game. Some people are die-hard Germans, some people are die-hard Russians, but most people just care about their K/D ratio. So who do they join? The Germans! So let's say your game now has 800 Germans and 200 Russians. And 1 German is worth 2 Russians in game-balance weight, so the Russians are effectively outgunned 8:1.

Well alright you say, I'll put them in instanced battles that force them to fight at the 1:2 German:Russian ratio, and those battles will determine the outcome of the campaign map RISK-style. So now Russians have a chance to win the battles they are actually in, because they actually do have their 1:2 ratio now. But now the 200 Russians can only engage 100 Germans at a time. Even if all of them win every single fight, there are still 700 Germans rampaging around the map with no opposition at all! The Germans will still absolutely roll the campaign map up like a carpet, no matter how much the Russians "win".

And that's why it most likely is best for the game if we ditch "Clans are just better" and instead aim for "Clans just play different, but get the same results".

[CantHandletheTruth]

SirMad, on 10 March 2015 - 07:35 AM, said:

if clan and IS are balanced, how do you explain the constant winning of planets for the clans?



taken from:
http://www.reddit.co..._battle_report/

IS pugs literally suck.

[Sjorpha]

Jonny Slam, you are making a great argument. It is a shame you are being so trolled as this is a really important issue.

One problem to discuss in regards to CW is that even though clan mechs are clearly stronger, clan pugs are being rolled over just as helplessly as IS pugs. Drop with a 12 man on attack and you will win 9/10 games regardless if you are Clan or IS.

This is due to the way the attacking and defending works. There is very little incentive for premades to defend, and very little opportunity for pugs to attack. This means that the premade vs. pug is the norm, and premade vs premade or pug vs pug is the exception.

So the actual balance gap between clan and IS rarely comes into play in actual CW matches. If you'd change it to 12 vs 10 all else being equal you would have a situation where defending as a clan pug would be nigh impossible, even if the odd premade vs premade would be balanced. I also don't thing 10 vs 12 would be balanced unless the clans were even more superior, because advantage in numbers with good players is a huge factor, but I'm not sure.

The idea that "everyone would only want to play clan" I think is false. I believe lots of people would find the combination of weaker mechs and larger numbers very fun. I'm one.

One thing is clear, quirks are a very very bad way of balancing the factions. If an IS heavy for example has too weak quirks to match the best clan heavy, then the factions stay unbalanced. But on the other hand if the quirks ARE strong enough, then they are so silly that they force the mech into a gimmicky entirely quirk based build, like the 9S before the nerf and the Dragon 1N right now. And none of these mechs compete with the good clan heavies, the quirks would need to be MORE silly to achieve that. Obviously this is completely unsustainable.

The factions have to be balanced in themselves, and quirks should only be little perks to give flavour and to balance bad chassi within a faction.

Tonnage limits is also a pretty bad way of balancing, because there is not a straight progression of tonnage to power in this game.

In the end it comes down to either give IS their thematic numerical advantage, or to go over the actual IS tech and make it as good as clan tech.

I'm not sure exactly what I think the best solution would be, it's a genuinely hard problem.

But maybe it can be solved through enough spamming of gifs and hyperbole?

Edited by Sjorpha, 10 March 2015 - 04:45 PM.

[ROSS-128]

Well, I suppose one surefire way to "inflate" Inner Sphere pop would be to allow IS to take 5-6 mechs in a drop deck (with an appropriate increase in available tonnage, so they're not forced to take 6 Locusts).

But it would run into problems like Lanchester's Square Law that would make it difficult to determine just how many extra mechs IS should get, and of course IS spamming mechs means that Clan K/D, CBill income, and EXP income get inflated. Which will make them a magnet for players who care about K/D, CBills, and EXP.

Also it would still throw solo/group queue all out of whack, since the other gamemodes don't have drop decks.

So making IS tech as good as Clan tech (just in a different way, and maybe good at different things) seems to be the way to go. And quirks are one way of doing that: an IS laser that would normally be craptastic compared to Clans can suddenly become good when it's quirked with -heat, -dur, and +range. Another thing that might help is Light Engines for IS (though they'd basically replace Standards on anything that doesn't need the two torso slots, the BNC-3E for example needs every single slot to squeeze all 3 AC/5s in there).

Experimenting with the quirk system probably would be interesting. Like the various ideas to maybe have "weapon variants" that have a balance of +quirks and -quirks (keeping a "standard" unquirked variant as a baseline). Or have equipment stuff, like an engine that has +top speed -acceleration, or a heat sink that has +dissipation -cap (or vice versa). So basically, letting players customize part of their quirks. Variations in tonnage and crit space could even be possible if quirked equipment becomes a thing.

Obviously there'd have to be tradeoffs though. Unlike chassis quirks that are intended to give mechs with poor geometry/hardpoints a helping hand, equipment perks would have to be designed to be net-neutral relative to the "standard" version, with picks coming down to either preference or synergy with the chassis. So they'd be sort of technically not-buffed, but capable of a whole new level of min-maxing.

Or just experiment with new and unique chassis quirks. +% carried ammo? -x LBX pellets (same damage, like laser duration)? Missile velocity? ECM/sensor range? Lock speed? Target retention?

[EgoSlayer]

Jonny Slam, on 09 March 2015 - 09:41 PM, said:

<snip>

Solo and group ques stay the same 12 vs 12 because you can pick whatever mech you want and can field, take a clan mech if you want or don't either way safe bet you will have more than a couple on your team. Those ques don't come into it.

<snip>

And this is a big reason why you can't have 12v10. Aside from all the match maker rewrites for 12v10, if the non-CW queues are still equal matches the Clans can't be over powered.

But for Clan to work in 12v10 they have to be 15-20% more effective and durable than IS mechs.
Put that 15-20% better for each mech into non-CW 12v12 and it becomes the team with the most clan mechs wins.
So nobody plays IS outside of CW unless they like losing.
And then nobody but old hands are playing IS in CW because you can't level your IS mechs outside of CW.
And taking new IS mechs into CW to level them is even more foolish, so nobody buys new IS mechs.

That is a far more likely mass exodus than the one you are proposing to happen if 12v10 isn't implemented.

Edited by EgoSlayer, 10 March 2015 - 06:05 PM.

[Wildstreak]

Mirumoto Izanami, on 10 March 2015 - 09:38 AM, said:

I don't have a horse in CW, nor do I think Clan tech is overpowering as instituted in MWO, but...nothing you posted here debunks or proves anything. Sadly, without full clarity on numbers, everything we post in the forums is based on too many assumptions to have a decent discussion.

May not be an exact number but there is a rough idea based on the in game incentives for joining Factions PGI is giving out, that is all we have outside those topics that are supposed to list who is fighting for who.

Apnu, on 10 March 2015 - 10:05 AM, said:

I don't think this is entirely true. Early on in CW, Kurita tried to keep the clans at bay and failed, now they're grinding out territory from Davion and ignoring the clan front. Why?

That tells me there's a balance issue between the tech and the factions.

Well, this generated an interesting realization for me regarding the map, year and what is available though if I mention it, some Clanners are going to try and kill me with Adder loaded with Flamers. They will miss but would try. Very interesting though.