43 replies to this topic

[Rebas Kradd]

Fewer mechs in-game, or forced to split up by dynamic objectives.

Just try a 4v4 once in a while. You'll be shocked by how durable your mech is.

[ROSS-128]

Almond Brown, on 10 April 2015 - 08:50 AM, said:

Well they would put the "Meta" on a seesaw. First up, Reflective for all. 3,500,000 to put on, 1,750,000 to take off. Next week Reactive for ALL. 2,750,000 to put on, 1,375,000 to take off. Next Reflective for all, again. LOL!

The resultant "Whining" would be GLORIOUS.



What! You don't like UAV's?

I was referring to their tradeoffs vs Standard Armor. TT gives them half damage to one type, double damage to the other because they are the same weight and crit space as standard.

So without the weakness to the opposite type, there would be no reason to ever equip standard armor. With the weakness, well, it depends on if you think half damage from lasers is worth doubling damage from ballistics or vice versa.

Though it also raises the question, how are you supposed to know what armor they have equipped? Will it be visible on the model?

[EvilCow]

Why don't just decrease the RoF of weapons? +25% to all weapons. It would also encourage diversity in loadouts.

[ROSS-128]

Hmm, apparently the wiki says they don't have the vulnerability to the opposite type. Which is odd because I could have swore my rulebook said they do. Maybe my rulebook is out of date and they were buffed later?

[Joseph Mallan]

E Rommel, on 10 April 2015 - 07:05 AM, said:

They didn't as far as I know, and reactive armor is supposed to take double damage from lasers too. I think OP just forgot their tradeoff was supposed to be "resistant to one, weak to the other".

Otherwise there'd be no reason not to take them.

Seems the WIKI is missing the negative aspect as well. Its why I asked.

[EvilCow]

In MW4 reflective and reactive armor offered increased protection for one weapon type and same protection for the other type, the downside was increased weight but it was not weaker to some weapons.

At equal weight those offered same protection for one type and reduced protection for the other type.

[LordKnightFandragon]

Lower TTK without convergeance?

Put lasers and weapons back to TT, or more along those lines.

Reduce heat scale to 40-50 points, so output isnt as high. And even if that reverts the game to cannon meta, well, it gets the same result of only 10-30 dmg, since Cannons are heavy and ammo dependant. LAsers would still be easy to use, but hot and slower.

Besides, TTK isnt so bad unless your getting gang banged or sniped by Gauss Whales.

[cSand]

I hate to preach again but we could make it so FF allows you to add additional armor (to the amount of extra tonnage provided) instead of just being pretty much useless

[Jetfire]

Fix GH and TTK in one fell swoop?

Implement a real heat penalty system with increasing CD's and decreasing speed the hotter you run with redline coming before 100% heat with chances to incur damage. Now running at 99% heat is not just a challenge... it is dangerous and subject to diminishing returns.

[LordKnightFandragon]

cSand, on 10 April 2015 - 11:32 AM, said:

I hate to preach again but we could make it so FF allows you to add additional armor (to the amount of extra tonnage provided) instead of just being pretty much useless

Lol, we dont need more armor.

Id be curious to see what the players saying they want more armor are doing in game. I have seen a number of assault mechs get spotted, shot, and just stand in the open getting pummeled by the entire team and die in like 5 seconds...wonder if any of them are the ones wanting more armor.

Just yesterday, on Caustic no less, cuz it seems im stuck there, walked up the side of the hill, and stood in 1 spot, didnt move or anything, as about 6 mechs wasted him....he was dead before I got from the base of the center hill to the top....

Meanwhile, mechs that dont get focused and instead take a hit, dish a hit and when its a back and forth, TTK is actually decent, unless the enemy is using some PPFLD meta build of Dual guass or something....

[DefinitelyNotMwHighlander]

Quxudica, on 09 April 2015 - 10:33 PM, said:

I still think a redesign of the heat system and changing convergence are the best options,

Also for the sake of being pedantic, you meant "increase TTK".

Oh absolutely. In a perfect world, the game would have correct heat penalties such as "@60% heat, movement speed is reduced and targeting becomes less reliable" etc. , and I don't think there is anyone who doesn't agree on removing super pin point convergence from this game. I think most people are aware of the TT heat penalty scale...





...but this thread topic is refering to more defensive equipement options in the mechlab, specifically.


I'm on the same page as those two points, but this is the third element needed to bring the game back to what many people want it to be, all the while adding significantly more depth in the mechlab (Time Line be damned for some of these items). However, unlike weapons in the future timeline, defensive equipment does not directly obsolete current weapons or allow power creep in that same regard. It just allows far more build options and play styles in the mechlab. People who like to lead a charge in an Atlas for instance would now have those tools and more toys to play around with in the mechlab other than simply maxing out the amor. There would be choices!

Almond Brown, on 10 April 2015 - 08:44 AM, said:

Why cancel out one with the other? We need more weight to be consumed (if that is the tact taken) for same or less, thus forcing the Mechs to carry more, non-weapons based "stuff".

Exactly, this in effect helps the issue two fold.

In the first aspect, it means players spend less tonnage on weapons (a CTF-3D for instance has about 39 tons to play around with for firepower). The second is that the tonnage spent on defensive equipment is directly related to assisting a mech survive longer. The end result are much more tactical and slug fest style games that players experienced in 8v8. Also, unlike the super hamfisted idea of "double armor values again", this solution provides more depth to the game and build options. Doubling armor again (yes, armor values are ALREADY doubled in MW:O), would massive benefit assault mechs and screw over lights! The end result of that would be a locust having 40 instead of 20 armor, while a Mad Cat and Atlas would have 162 and 220 front armor respectfully! NO thank you! And in the end, the game is still super offensive oriented, so it would change very little in that regard. The game does not need a bandaid fix, it needs a rework of game mechanics and a more in depth mech lab!

Joseph Mallan, on 10 April 2015 - 06:25 AM, said:

When did they remove the double damage from ballistic attacks for Reflective Armor?

I was never aware that Reflective armor was more prone to ballistic damage in the first place. Also, reactive armor is NOT more protective against ballistics, at any time. It was more protective against missile and artillery. Mechwarrior 4 changed reactive armor to be more protective against ballistics instead of missile to be a reverse pair of reflective armor. And even then, it did so by making the armor heavier per ton, so to achieve the same protection as FF against the non specialized incoming damage, you needed to spend more tonnage. It made sense. exchange significant tonnage for additional protection against one damage type and equal protection against the rest. I believe it was 24 points per ton, exactly 1/3 heavier than FF armor, which was the default armor on all mechs in that game.

Sarna.net never states any weakness at all of either making a mech more vulnerable to a different weapon type. If someone has an old TRO that states such the case that would be great. But semantics aside, the end argument I am attempting to make is that it be included in the game at all. I'm much more interested that players have access to either armor type in game to give them more defensive options than what specifically the armor protects per ton, or the draw backs etc. As long as the benefits are worth the tonnage to allow more depth in the game.

Right now with the "lazor vomit" meta, a mech mounting reflective armor would crush. It would surely do wonders for meta as it would force many players to take more ballistics which are more or less regarded as not as powerful. Again, leading to a series of small checks and balances, rocks paper scissors style meta that Battletech and past mechwarrior games had. Lots of little advantages but no one hard counter, end all meta that the game more or less has now.

CSJ Ranger, on 10 April 2015 - 02:14 AM, said:

we have small maps, so the games are over quickly, because you will surely introduce anything that brings this up to the maximum of the 15 minutes in duration

Indeed, with small maps mechs are going to go down relatively quickly, however, the speed at which they go down and the style of play the mechs and players would experience would be drastically different. Instead of all out offense nascar, you could have a couple gun boat type mechs in the back with XL engines and FF, while you had front line brawler type mechs in the front with tonnage dedicated to hardened armor or compact gyros or what have you. These more tanky builds could then be able to successfully lead a charge into a pack without reenacting the intro scene of robocop, allow other mechs to deal damage while they brawl. I would love to see a super tanky built Atlas build. Scary stuff, man.

[Deathlike]

I doubt we're going to have these nice things soon™.

[DefinitelyNotMwHighlander]

Deathlike, on 10 April 2015 - 05:02 PM, said:

I doubt we're going to have these nice things soon™.

I want to believe....

[MrMadguy]

You know. MechWarrior wasn't my first game about 'Mechs. My first game was Starsiege. So I was always wondering, why equipment in MW is not so diverse. For example, I was always wondering, why MW doesn't have such an obvious thing, as Shield Generator? (Please note, I'm one of those ppl, who believes, that gameplay >> lore, so I don't care about lorewise reasons behind this at all) How it works? It absorbs some amount of damage and then it should be recharged - it takes time and consumes energy of reactor's capacitor (Starsiege's analog of heat). Would be great to counter high pinpoint Alphas! Don't you think?

Why PGI don't want to increase survivability of 'Mechs? They put themselves into this situation by themselves. The problem is in too stretched range of firepowers among different 'Mechs and 'Mech variants: we are beginning from 10 fire power of cheating Lights, who mounted 1xERLGL or 1xERPPC to camp you from 1k meters and ending with DireGods, who may have up to 100 firepower. What that means? If PGI will implement some defensive features to counter things, like 100 firepower, by doing it they'll put Lights to where they actually should be - to situation, where they actually can't kill Heavy/Assault 1vs1. Shield Generator will absorb enough dmg to prevent them from effectively using tactics like MG spam, SPL spam, ERLGL/ERPPC camping, backstabbing. And PGI want to earn $$$ from selling them, so want to keep them as OP and cheating, as they are now.

Edited by MrMadguy, 10 April 2015 - 10:09 PM.

[DefinitelyNotMwHighlander]

MrMadguy, on 10 April 2015 - 09:10 PM, said:

Why PGI don't want to increase survivability of 'Mechs?

PGI does have intentions to make mechs more durable and increase Time To Kill, but they are simply making no strives, or known progress on doing so.

If anything, with new mechs and quirks, they have actually decreased it, making the battlefield far more volatile and deadly.

[EvilCow]

I think there is the "blue shield" in BT that protects agains PPCs but it never made it into any MW game so far.

http://www.sarna.net...Blue_Shield_PFD

Of course it would pointless in MWO, nobody would care defending against PPCs after those have been "balanced" out of existence.

[DefinitelyNotMwHighlander]

EvilCow, on 10 April 2015 - 09:28 PM, said:

I think there is the "blue shield" in BT that protects agains PPCs but it never made it into any MW game so far.

http://www.sarna.net...Blue_Shield_PFD

Of course it would pointless in MWO, nobody would care defending against PPCs after those have been "balanced" out of existence.

PPC's could use a definite buff (such as ERPPC's have insane velocities around 1500-1800m/s and IS ERPPC damage up to 10+2 splash to justify the insane heat, while standard PPC remove minimum range)

But that is more a topic of current weapon balance. The blue shield particle field dampener I believe begins testing/production like 3051. MW:O already has thrown out the time line with some gear and mech variants already, so it wouldn't be a far stretch to include it in game if that is the only argument against including it.

I can only speculate that if MW:O survives another year or two, a time line jump and inclusion of other PPC weaponry/equipment like Heavy PPC's, Snub Nose PPCs, Light PPCs, PPC Capacitors, etc this piece of equipment would have great uses to augment a mech's defense.

[oldradagast]

Quxudica, on 10 April 2015 - 04:57 AM, said:

For example, imagine if Strikes and UAV's were equipment instead of magical cards we pull out of our mechs rear ends. Imagine if that equipment was restricted to mech variants that fall into either the scout or command roles. Now two roles with little to no defined meat on them suddenly have useful tools specific to their kit, tools compelling enough to really consider dropping a medium laser for. Simultaneously this offers the possibility of increasing the potency of these tools (now that not every single mech can take them with zero trade off) and increasing the depth of their functionality. Maybe a scout has to paint a target area with a TAG like laser for x seconds before the strike triggers, or the command mech has to use his Command Console to designate a grid on the map to be bombed but the resulting strikes are stronger or more accurate.

Agreed.

They want "role warfare," but every mech can basically do the same thing, with only sliding scale being speed and firepower. Even toughness isn't really a sliding scale since bigger mechs have more armor but are hit easier and are slower.

I still say Light alone should have been able to equip strikes and maybe other such equipment, but instead everyone does the same thing... it gets old... I like your suggested ideas.

DefinitelyNotMwHighlander, on 10 April 2015 - 09:25 PM, said:

PGI does have intentions to make mechs more durable and increase Time To Kill, but they are simply making no strives, or known progress on doing so.

If anything, with new mechs and quirks, they have actually decreased it, making the battlefield far more volatile and deadly.

Yep. They keep talking about, for example, getting rid of "Pinpoint" in the skills list - because it does nothing - and adding something that makes components more durable. They've been talking about that for months, and yet nothing has been done, which just seems silly. But, hey - pump out more mechs and try to keep the game afloat is the current system, I guess. Ugh.

[Lord0fHats]

I definitely want to see the armor types added. Personally though, I'd add them as modules. Refractive Coating, Reflective Coating, and Standard Coating. Adjust numbers as desired. I think going 50% is too much. More in the range of 20-25% imo would be better. I don't want TTK increased by that much I'd have no other effects personally. Just give every mech an 'armor coating' module slot and let players pick the one they want. Would definitely lead to more diverse mech builds at the very least, and make fights a lot more rewarding at best (I want longer fights, so sue me). Be nice to play a game where mechs are tanky enough that the shortest route to victory is not kill all the mechs.

[Alistair Winter]

I do think it's a pity that equipment is a rather insignificant part of mech building. We've got jump jets, ECM, BAP, TAG, NARC, CASE, AMS and targeting computers. I'd love to have more options, and I'd love it if equipment was more valuable. Beyond ECM and the Mk I Targeting computer, I think most builds just ignore all other sorts of equipment for the sake of maximum guns, ammo and heatsinks.

I'd love to increase TTK and I'd love to see more equipment. I really miss the different armor types from MW2:Mercs. It would also be great to have Guardian and Angel ECM as separate pieces of equipment. And it would be cool if Command Console was something more than a really big targeting computer.