401 replies to this topic

[Koniks]

PremithiumX, on 21 April 2015 - 01:21 PM, said:

Quirks should favor a mech's stock loadouts, not seemingly random systems.

Stock loadouts are objectively terrible given the game's mechanics. Quirks should match the hardpoints.

[Evan20k]

La Malinche: Replace the AC10 quirks with Gauss quirks. The mech is much more capable with a gauss rifle than any type of autocannon.

Warhawk: The PPC isn't a good weapon at all and the PPC quirks don't do much to alieviate that.

Grasshopper needs some range quirks badly.

[Postumus]

The mechs most in need of quirk changes (as in underperforming) are, in my opinion:

Jenner (all)

Shadowhawk (all) - This mech was good a long time ago, before jumpjet and PPC changes. Now it is one of the least played and least competitive medium mechs, at least in higher tier gameplay.

Hunchback 4H - The problem here is half the fact that a single AC/10 is nigh useless, and half the fact that it gets a range quirk instead of a heavy velocity quirk. The main problem with the AC/10 is that it sits at an unhappy medium - lower damage than gauss or AC/20, and too slow of a projectile to take advantage of the extra range it has vs. the AC/20.

Orion (all) - These need serious love. This is the kind of mech that needs to be quirked to fill a particular niche for it's variants. It's size and hitboxes make it suicide to take an XL engine, but not tanky enough with a standard engine, and it doesn't get either quirks for a good mid-range build to allow it to stand off and survive, or quirks for a very effective short range build to let it compensate by firepower.

Highlander (all) - The bottom of this hot pile of garbage. It just got re-quirked, but in the wrong way. While the maneuverability quirks were nice, this is not a mech where a little extra torso twist speed or acceleration is going to make a difference. This mech is huge like an Atlas, but lacks Atlas-like durability, and can carry even less weaponry. This mech needs some weapon-specific, tier 4 or so weapon quirks than can give the variants well designed roles. The armor and structure quirks would ideally focus on the torso, with the right ballistic arm as a second consideration. Increasing the engine cap would be great, otherwise give it a better speed quirk, maybe 15%.

Cataphract - The 4X is the only variant that seems to have some focus to its quirks. The 3D has it the worst, probably because it used to be the king of jump sniping, but why that would even be a consideration after jumpsniping has been dead for almost 2 years I don't know. Out of all of the possible builds you can do with the 3D, UAC/5 dakka is one of the worst, and it doesn't even get good quirks for it besides jam chance. The kind of builds where the 3D excels are things like AC/20 and PPC, AC/20 and 5ML, 2xAC/10 and PPC, Gauss and 2x ERLL. Combinations of heavier ballistics and energy, not dakka.

The 2X originally had a great set of brawling quirks, which were quickly turned into a mediocre set of general quirks.
The 1X is also saddled with a giant mess of mediocre general quirks that don't allow it to excel in any role.

[Smag]

Weapon quirks really screw with stuff. However, structure/armor buffs for disadvantaged/bulky chassis are pretty much always going to be on target. Quirks should aid balance, not reinforce meta.

[John80sk]

I don't dislike any particular quirks, I just dislike the seeming lack of consistency in them across the board.

For example the Firestarter was a T1 light pre-quirk, and has some of the strongest quirks of any light mech (granted not on the previous T1 variants, but still). If the quirks on the firestarter are the established baseline for where lights should be at, commando's should be 5x as good.

The stalker was a T2 assault pre-quirk, probably T1 after the jumpsniping meta died really. Why does it have any positive quirks, let alone quirks on the same level of the Awesome?

The Dragon 1N is one of the few T5 mechs that actually got some heavy quirkage, but none of the other Dragons got much of anything useful.

Some things need to be tested, but you can get there ballpark with simple logical reasoning. Meaning the Firestarter and Jenner quirks should be the weakest of all light quirks, while the commando and locust should have the strongest.

[Nightmare1]

The quirks I like the least are the nonsensical ones like the ill-conceived LRM 10 quirk on the QKD-4H a while back. I also am not a fan of this huge bevy of bland Medium Laser quirks we're seeing of late. Let's have more specialized quirks to help chassis fill certain niches/roles better! The AC/5 quirk on one of the Dragons and the HBK AC/20 and Gauss quirks are great examples of this!

Medium laser quirks on a Battlemaster 1G? Nah, not so great. Large Pulse quirks would be better. The 1D had Large Laser quirks which were nice, but now it has these measly ML ones instead. Similarly, the 1S lost the meaningful LRM quirks and got ML quirks instead (ML Heat Generation, seriously???). It's a homogeneous blend of quirkiness that results in bland, useless attributes that do nothing to promote the natural role of the Mech. How about eliminating the ML quirks on these chassis and others like it, and buffing the corresponding general quirks by the same amount as the ML quirks? Or give back the LL and LRM quirks on the 1D and 1S and come up with something better for the 1G than ML quirks.

Just my 2 cents on the matter...

[CupraZero]

My least liked Quirks are;

1) Quickdraw: It has Missile Quirks like its used to, but has far too few tubes per Hardpoint to effectively use them. 1x10port and 2x4port doesnt really give someone a choice between lrm and srm.

2) Dragon: The 1N 50% AC5 cooldown is too much. Reduce this one a bit and give it some other ballistic quirks instead. 5N and 1C on the other hand could need some love.

3) Blackjack -1 -1DC: Basically the same quirks for both Variants makes the not jump-capable -1DC kind of pointless.

Bonusround for Assaultlove:
Atlas and Awesome need their Structure Quirks revamped into Armor Quirks. And both could use a few more armor Quirks in general to bring them in line, Awesome a bit more than the Atlas.

[Nightshade24]

My personal opinions?

1) any very high quirk that makes any other weapon obsolete of that weapon type. (ie any 40-50% velocity, heat reduction, or fire rate quirks).

possible fix- besides hte obvious "lowering to 40% or lower). Add simular quirks to the weapon type but NOT to the same strength. Let's use a random mech for eg. A Cataphract 3D.

stock wise it has 2 different ballistics, UAC 5 and a LBX 10.

instead of say on top of a 12.5% ballistics fire rate a "12.5% LBX 10 velocity" giving the LBX 10 a 25% bonus making it quite a dominant ballistic weapon on the chassis.

you could have say the 12.5% LBX 10 velocity and then say a 6% UAC 5 velocity for the velocity quirk.
Or make it completely different and say have a 12.5% Fire Rate quirk.

Something that can prevent boating. (boating is fine and dandy, but if boating is the ONLY way to play the mech well then there is a problem, for eg Stalker 4N)


2) Most missile quirks.

I know it's great to have the choice of viarity but now the whole transfer to generic missile quirks for anything that is an SRM or a LRM kinda ruins the possibilities of any uniqueness to a chassi.

Having some mechs with ONLY lrm quirks or SRM quirks could help, as well as some with 1 or 2 LRM's or SRM's focused.


3) Quite a few clan quirks.

I think the omnipod bonus and CT of the mech should be much more significant.

Let's say for eg if your mech uses 100% stock omnipods then your Timberwolf D has much stronger ER PPC quirks and SSRM 6 quirks.

This will prevent people slapping an A torso or what ever and have suddenly 3 very high ER PPC's that could be OP in this way but balanced if they are on the arms.

That or strong quirks to a Mad Dog C for the ballistics.


Omni pod bonus should strengthen most quirks and the CT should also have quirks to help with the rest.

Let's say the Adder Prime has ER PPC quirks, arm gives 5% reduced heat each and the CT gives 3 % heat reduction.
On the prime having all those omni pods would give 13% heat reduction on ER PPC's while copying the build on the Adder B would give only 10%. or something like this.

[Nightshade24]

I would also want to mention quirks for mechs that used to be the best that now suffer.

Cataphract, highlander, atlas, jenner, etc all suffer issues.

Another mention is that we need more then just weapon quirks.
Maybe a mech shouldn't have that much of a weapon quirk that directly ties to spread, fire rate, heat, etc. but instead has quirks to boost targeting computers, MASC, heat damage, ammo, ammo chance to explode or CASE effectiveness, maybe increases heat sink efficiency of that chassis (NOTE: Nova would love you for this), or jumpjet efficiency. etc...

Lore quirks are also needed, Things like how the highlander has a reinforced cockpit and legs. I would like a quirk for the highlander to specifically reduce fall damage to the legs (maybe something for JJ strength) and the head having extra armour.

[SpiralFace]

Mizeur, on 21 April 2015 - 02:29 PM, said:

Stock loadouts are objectively terrible given the game's mechanics. Quirks should match the hardpoints.

If this was the case, only a few quirk options would be consider relevant enough to be sought out by the "competitive" community.

At the end of the day, this is a battletech licensed product, and the game should at least respect that heritage for those that DO want to play to it.

That being said, I fully agree with your statement that stock load-outs are terrible given the current game mechanics. And if anything, the mechanics should change to at least widen the field to what is actually considered viable. (not make stock mechs viable, but just a wider range of what is considered viable to include a much more diverse lineup then what you currently see in the game.)

Edited by SpiralFace, 22 April 2015 - 05:38 AM.

[Koniks]

We already have only a few quirk options that are sought out by the competitive community. That's not really going to change unless relevant quirks are applied to more or all mechs.

Respecting the BattleTech lore makes for bad gameplay right now. Unless they change the mechanics to make lore builds viable, gameplay should trump lore.

ETA: I'm not arguing they should make every mech a 7xMPL or 6xLL laser boat. But, for example, quirking the LB-10-X on the ON1-M because it's stock instead of an actually useful ballistic isn't helping the mech.

Edited by Mizeur, 22 April 2015 - 06:49 AM.

[Snowseth]

Almost any "Missile Range" quirk regardless of chassis.

The only Missile Range quirk that would be remotely useful for be Streak Range.
So grouped quirks designed to make a wicked Streak-a-mech would be good.
But random Missile Range quirks, especially on mechs with only 1 missile hardpoint need to go away.

Replace most of them with Missile Velocity quirks.

[Bront]

Mcgral18, on 21 April 2015 - 07:56 AM, said:

MG range quirks; due to the CoF, the quirk is nearly worthless. It just causes more spread.

MGs are hitscan, not CoF. The effect looks like CoF, but it's not.

[Tiamat of the Sea]

Bront, on 22 April 2015 - 08:12 AM, said:

MGs are hitscan, not CoF. The effect looks like CoF, but it's not.

....not exactly. MGs have a cone, and a hitscan 'line' that wanders semi-randomly throughout that cone as they fire. So they're kinda both. The bullet spray is not, however, actually representative of the 'real' cone.

[Soul Tribunal]

The ones I dislike the most are the lack of Structure and Armor Quirks to my Poor Victor. It needs some Armor Love to stay Viable, I think.

The only other one off the Top of my Head is the Re-Pass that was done on the BJ-1DC (give this one back its AC5 option please, or a bigger general Ballastic Quirk).

-ST

[Koniks]

Quickdraw Crobat, on 22 April 2015 - 08:20 AM, said:

....not exactly. MGs have a cone, and a hitscan 'line' that wanders semi-randomly throughout that cone as they fire. So they're kinda both. The bullet spray is not, however, actually representative of the 'real' cone.

Yeah, they're hitscan in that they have no velocity so you don't have to lead them. Actual damage is applied in a cone.

[chrx]

Warhawk: Buff the ERPPC heat generation quirk when using Prime arms from -8% to -15% (same as the adder) to make the stock build more viable. WHK-C and B have superior omnipods and CTs anyway.

Jenner F: Give it more CT armor, medium laser range and beam duration quirks to make it equal to Firestarters.

Ember: Needs better medium laser quirks, the MG range quirk is useless. Firestarters in general should have heat generation instead of range quirks to help brawling. Small pulse (and small) lasers should get a general range increase instead of quirking them useful only for the FS9-A.

[warner2]

Poor Grasshopper.

GHR-5H - medium laser cool down 10%

If you are going to quirk medium lasers on a heavy 'mech (especially one so big) it should be range. Medium lasers are limited by range so the first step to improving them on a heavy is to give them more range. On a smaller, faster 'mech I'd be OK with cool down as it'll boost it's up-front DPS in a brawl but on a heavy or assault 'mech better ability to poke is more useful and that means range.

Give it medium laser range boost or better yet generic energy range boost.

GHR-5N - PPC heat generation 10%

If you are going to quirk PPCs on any 'mech the first quirk to give it is a velocity boost. PPCs were over-nerfed when their velocity was reduced and they are only really interesting weapons on those 'mechs that have better velocity (and there are many). So give the 5N better PPCs by making them travel faster.

Edited by warner2, 22 April 2015 - 09:59 AM.

[Mcgral18]

Bront, on 22 April 2015 - 08:12 AM, said:

MGs are hitscan, not CoF. The effect looks like CoF, but it's not.

They are hitscan+CoF
Spread of 1.5, as opposed to the SRM6s 5.7 and 5.9.


Go to the testing grounds, shoot the Commando, watch hit entire body light up.


Better yet, try to headshot the Commando.
I think I've made my point.

[Mike Forst]

Hello everyone. Thanks for your replies!

I will be reviewing this thread later today and gathering feedback info.