191 replies to this topic

[Mcgral18]

CantHandletheTruth, on 10 March 2015 - 04:21 PM, said:

IS pugs literally suck.

Well, it's more the stock mechs.


Not even trials; full on stock robots. With SHS and stock armour allocation.


You'll see a dozen after a few matches.

[Void Angel]

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?

Not until you talk about the Timber Wolf and the Stormcrow. You can compare underperforming chassis all you like, but someone's gonna see your Dire Wolf and raise you a Highlander every time. You're also forgetting that Clans are getting a quirk pass soon, too - so comparing underperformers may be a doubly moot point. The issue of faction balance is not whether a Spider 5V, Summoner, Dire Wolf, or Highlander is a top-tier competitor; it's whether the top-tier competitors from each faction are fighting on an even field overall. It's about top comps v. top comps - conflating faction balance with the balance within a faction is not helpful, and leads to faulty conclusions.

In the final analysis, no one posting on this thread knows, unless there was a dev post I missed. We don't have the data sets we'd need to parse in order to even begin to authoritatively answer the question in empirical grounds. The only people who do have access to that data have decided that a small tonnage advantage is warranted. So. We can keep our own council on how confident we are in their judgement if we like - but if we insist that our opinion is correct despite not even having access to the evidence needed to prove it, we succeed only in demonstrating that our reasoning is not based on facts.

Edited by Void Angel, 10 March 2015 - 07:45 PM.

[CantHandletheTruth]

Mcgral18, on 10 March 2015 - 07:40 PM, said:

Well, it's more the stock mechs.


Not even trials; full on stock robots. With SHS and stock armour allocation.


You'll see a dozen after a few matches.

Yeah, like I said.

[gurila]

I can't understand how anyone could feel that the current state of balance is so off that it would require uneven player numbers. I'm just not seeing it. I see imbalance, sure. It's there. It's slight. I don't know that quirks, specifically, are the correct action to take, but they are the correct spirit. Small, incremental changes over time. What is being proposed here is, honestly, preposterous, especially without hard data to back it up. The imbalance simply isn't that bad. The tonnage change made recently is a terrific example of PGI making adjustments. Small, incremental changes over time. Cool your jets. They have the data, and they obviously aren't afraid to take action based on it. The fact that they are not moving at a pace that meets with your approval by no means spells doom and gloom for this game, or it's community.

[Onimusha shin]

gurila, on 10 March 2015 - 08:03 PM, said:

I can't understand how anyone could feel that the current state of balance is so off that it would require uneven player numbers. I'm just not seeing it. I see imbalance, sure. It's there. It's slight. I don't know that quirks, specifically, are the correct action to take, but they are the correct spirit. Small, incremental changes over time. What is being proposed here is, honestly, preposterous, especially without hard data to back it up. The imbalance simply isn't that bad. The tonnage change made recently is a terrific example of PGI making adjustments. Small, incremental changes over time. Cool your jets. They have the data, and they obviously aren't afraid to take action based on it. The fact that they are not moving at a pace that meets with your approval by no means spells doom and gloom for this game, or it's community.

WORD

[ApolloKaras]

Mcgral18, on 10 March 2015 - 07:40 PM, said:

Well, it's more the stock mechs.


Not even trials; full on stock robots. With SHS and stock armour allocation.


You'll see a dozen after a few matches.

This is something that is a STRONG possibility. IS mechs are cheap, to where the Clan mechs are quite a bit more expensive... In the end I believe Pin point front loaded damage would rule the day.

[Stoned Prophet]

LordBraxton, on 09 March 2015 - 05:23 PM, said:

I think he was using sarcasm to agree with you

the holy trinity is impossible to beat, but to be fair, the rest of the clan mechs are like mid tier IS mechs

So, youre saying most of the clan mechs are like most of the inner sphere mechs?!!?!? and that there are a few top contenders?!?!!? JUST LIKE THE IS HAS?!!?!?!

[GeneralArmchair]

He's saying that the lackluster mechs won't be played in significant numbers on either side so it is pointless to compare them.


The mechs that get played most are the best that each faction can field. When comparing the best in class, the clans win in every category other than lights (until they get the Arctic cheater)

[Weeny Machine]

Prosperity Park, on 09 March 2015 - 06:39 PM, said:

The biggest source of this problem is BattleTech fans.  They expect Clans to be better.  Not "separate but equal," but better.  This game will never be balanced as long as people want Clans to be better.

Oh my, these idiots! I mean who expects Mechwarrior to be like a Battletech game. Clans are such a minor triviality and just a sidenote in the BT universe that PGI should just change it.Sorry for that piece of sarcasm, however, the TT showed how imbalanced the clans are and that only the honour code and the numerical superiority of the IS were able to somewhat balance the gameplay. That should have spoken volumes - apparently not for PGI.To make it worse: they added instant convergence with pin point accuracy.

Edited by Bush Hopper, 12 March 2015 - 12:29 PM.

[Metus regem]

Bush Hopper, on 12 March 2015 - 12:27 PM, said:

Oh my, these idiots! I mean who expects Mechwarrior to be like a Battletech game. Clans are such a minor triviality and just a sidenote in the BT universe that PGI should just change it.Sorry for that piece of sarcasm, however, the TT showed how imbalanced the clans are and that only the honour code and the numerical superiority of the IS were able to somewhat balance the gameplay. That should have spoken volumes - apparently not for PGI.To make it worse: they added instant convergence with pin point accuracy.

damn it, I just fixed the stupid thing too....

[CocoaJin]

I wish PGI hadn't been so insistent on comp style balance for CW. I wish they had chosen from the start to build out a competitive CW through a concerted model of balance through asymmetry. This asymmetry need not be solely through chassis attributes, but through systems of logistics(available resources, time to "x", "x" being all sorts of things like transit/re-spawn cool-downs, re-supply timers, etc, etc. We'd have differences in production/industry dependence, combat/mission sustainability in the face of attrition, etc) team size, tonnage limits(in place soon), counter-attack response, attack warning.

Logistically, CW could be a Blitzkrieg oriented fight for Clans(at least initially), where territory acquisition provides much needed strategic turn-key assets to maintain their war machine and territory advancement. While for IS it might best be a sustained war of attrition through stalemate operations and scorched earth tactics when falling back, in order to deny the Clans ease of acquiring readily available and operational means of resources and production...at least until it begins to put the Clans on their heels.

My God, if they let me creatively lay out the background mechanics of CW, we'd have a dynamic theater of war rarely seen in a multiplayer territory capture game. We'd have asymmetric objectives and victory conditions catered to the factions and their ultimate goals(which the other side can chose to adopt if they choose, such as blitz vs Attrition), universal objectives, territory acquisition/capture mechanics(24 through 8 player matches), incursion(non-capture, using variable 16-8 player matches that can be asymmetric team match-ups...yes, you could have 6vs4 of whatever combination) mechanics that can be used as recon, probing attacks interdiction and harassment.

We'd have the ability to spend resources to attempt geo-political disruption of planet centers in order to soften planets non-militarily well in advance(like days or even weeks) of any proposed/desired attack...of course we'd need to have a limited reach on such actions.

And the beauty of it all, it's all mainly background mechanics and map icons that set up variable constraints on the matches and the victory conditions.

[Fishbulb333]

Bored waiting for CW queue, so I'll pitch in my 2 cents..Just some random observations in no particular order.

I average around 20-30% more damage per CW match on the IS side than the Clan side.

I lose a lot more CW pug matches on the IS side than the Clan side.

I see waay more goofy/fun/justplainbad builds on the IS side than the clan side.

Not enough IS players use standard engines.

It's a lot harder to screw up a clan mech in the mechlab than an IS mech.

The clan mech's are generally stronger and better all-rounders than their IS counterparts, but when trying to build a mech for a specific role there's almost always a better option on the IS side than the clan side, for example - snipers (quirked ppc, 65 ton dual gauss), Light mechs (duh), LRM boats, ballistics (maybe excluding DWF, but tbh the king crab comes pretty close there)..of course the clans have some significant advantages in other areas too, but the balance between the 2 factions is, in my opinion, much closer than most people care to admit.