282 replies to this topic

[Y E O N N E]

Wintersdark, on 22 April 2015 - 04:11 AM, said:

Was there a new set of quirks that prompted this thread? Or is it about the old quirks? As it stands, PGI does look like they've got a bit gun shy with new quirks, as per the clan mechs. Or did I miss something?

The new reinforcement 'Mechs have some utterly insane quirks. Not so much in weapons, but in armor and structure. The Locust got bumped to being a 25+ ton Light, Nova a 95 ton medium, etc. Go take a look.

[Bishop Steiner]

Wintersdark, on 22 April 2015 - 04:11 AM, said:

Was there a new set of quirks that prompted this thread? Or is it about the old quirks? As it stands, PGI does look like they've got a bit gun shy with new quirks, as per the clan mechs. Or did I miss something?

Yes, you apparently did.

No, in seriousness, it's a mix. SOme quirks have been out of whack since Quirks 1, more got wonky at Quirks 2 and 2.5, the Initial Clan ones blew...... and then the new Reinforcements they went full IS stupid, so it's kind of "enough is enough".

They may seem a little gunshy on offensive quirks of late, but the armor and structure quirks are beyond getting out of hand.
http://mwomercs.com/reinforcementstwo
Highlander and Nova are particularly ridiculous. And they don't even address the real issues with the Highlander, which if at some point they do, like Russ commented at the TH, then the HGN will need to have those quirks nerfed, probably.

Edited by Bishop Steiner, 22 April 2015 - 04:45 AM.

[FupDup]

Bishop Steiner, on 22 April 2015 - 04:43 AM, said:

Yes, you apparently did.

No, in seriousness, it's a mix. SOme quirks have been out of whack since Quirks 1, more got wonky at Quirks 2 and 2.5, the Initial Clan ones blew...... and then the new Reinforcements they went full IS stupid, so it's kind of "enough is enough".

Tehy may seem a little gunshy on offensive quirks of late, but the armor and structure quirks are beyond getting out of hand.

I think they ramped up the durability quirks in direct response to outcries over "too strong" of weapon quirks.

But dat pendulum tho.

[Bishop Steiner]

FupDup, on 22 April 2015 - 04:45 AM, said:

I think they ramped up the durability quirks in direct response to outcries over "too strong" of weapon quirks.

But dat pendulum tho.

exactly.

Could you imagine walking into the game today in one of the Mechs we used in CB? No quirks, No Modules, etc? Be like a Baby Seal in a shark tank.

Yeah the DRG and some others needed a quirk system to make them viable. Others it adds flavor to. But as you say, the pendulum (or because it sounds more appropriate to the folks in question, the Yo Yo as I call it) is swinging like crazy....

[SmoothCriminal]

Just to be certain (because this is sounding insane) - the Highlander's +29 CT armour quirk, given that armour value is doubled, means that's an extra 58 armour? So it would take 3 AC20 rounds (approx.) just to get it back to what is was pre-quirk?

[Bishop Steiner]

SmoothCriminal, on 22 April 2015 - 04:55 AM, said:

Just to be certain (because this is sounding insane) - the Highlander's +29 CT armour quirk, given that armour value is doubled, means that's an extra 58 armour? So it would take 3 AC20 rounds (approx.) just to get it back to what is was pre-quirk?

not doubled, the quirks are as they are. Still means more CT armor than an Atlas

[Almond Brown]

SmoothCriminal, on 22 April 2015 - 04:55 AM, said:

Just to be certain (because this is sounding insane) - the Highlander's +29 CT armour quirk, given that armour value is doubled, means that's an extra 58 armour? So it would take 3 AC20 rounds (approx.) just to get it back to what is was pre-quirk?

Nope. The base armor is 2X, this is just 29 extra points. So 1.45 extra AC20's to strip. They are just making you waste ammo shooting CT's peeps. Don't do it!

[Artgathan]

On the one hand, some quirks are ridiculous. On the other hand, without quirks the only things that differentiate mechs are their hitboxes and location of hardpoints.

An interesting point to remember is that the first quirks we saw in the game were mobility quirks for Medium mechs, which were aimed at addressing the fact that most mediums had maneuverability on par with Heavy and Assault mechs (despite being much smaller). The underlying problems in MW:O's mobility system have never really been addressed.

That said, component-specific quirks are more interesting as they can help to kill two birds with one stone.

[Water Bear]

FupDup, on 22 April 2015 - 04:45 AM, said:

I think they ramped up the durability quirks in direct response to outcries over "too strong" of weapon quirks.

But dat pendulum tho.

I interpret armor / structure quirks as a way of saying "dps and TTK are so high now that we feel a need to increase the life (or durability) of mechs even further."

I really agree with your pendulum comment. This is called mechanism design in game theory. The idea is to add things to your game that force players to behave in a certain way. If the developers want the interactions they used to have (such as tanking) before a Dire Whale could pump 80 damage out of 4 UAC 10s (or the quirked DRG-1N existed), they have to increase survivability.

I suppose they can do it this way, it just seems silly to me. Instead of introducing laughably strong things in the first place, why not tone everything down before release to keep it in line with what already exists.

Anyway, the relevance to this thread:

I assume they released the clans knowing they were far too strong to generate sales, and then began nerfing things / buffing things to restore balance after demand dried up. I assume they haven't just straight nerfed the clans the whole way because of player back lash. Far better to nerf them a little and buff the IS mechs so the paying customers don't feel shafted (even though the net effect of all this is their clan mechs will eventually be brought in line with the power of mechs that already existed).

I guess all I'm saying is what I said before: If you do over haul quirks you have to over haul clan balance when you do it because that's what quirks are for. To address IS / Clan balance.

Edited by Water Bear, 22 April 2015 - 05:52 AM.

[MechWarrior5152251]

Trying to balance IS and Clan tech was simply impossible. The holy grail of Clan XL simply cannot be balanced without allowing IS to lose a side torso or making clans as fragile as IS. They have already brought weapon ranges closer together, but without being equal they would have to give something to IS to balance them....

The Simple solution would be to drastically increase Cooldowns for all Clan weapons. They still do their "Superior" Clan Tech on paper, just have lower damage per second. Clans suddenly become cool running compared to IS, but would lose some of their edge.

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

lol... armor quirks... On this mech we put 10 tons of armor, the same as the other mech but its absorbing as though it was 12 ... get the scientists in here NOW

[Almond Brown]

Mechwarrior Buddah, on 22 April 2015 - 08:24 AM, said:

lol... armor quirks... On this mech we put 10 tons of armor, the same as the other mech but its absorbing as though it was 12 ... get the scientists in here NOW

What with all the BS Laser Vomit going on, consider it a placeholder for when they intro "Reflective and Reactive" armor types.

[Stoned Prophet]

Stoned Prophet, on 21 April 2015 - 08:02 AM, said:

How?

Bishop Steiner, on 21 April 2015 - 08:08 AM, said:

If I have to explain that bro, you need to Battletech more.

Mechs in this game end up being the TT mech sin name only. Instead we have barely jump capable sword and board, lopsided sniper mechs, with insanely out of character quirks, like (for a time) the TDR-9S becoming the premiere ER PPC sniper? Really, on a mech that packed a single ER PPC? Better than the AWS which was supposed to pack 3 PPC/ER PPC? Large laser locusts firing that laser every 2 seconds? Doubled armor, no mech remotely fulfilling the roles they were meant to fulfill, due to minmax mechlab metas, etc?

Obviously things have to be adapted by environment, as noted above on my heatscale comment to Kapusta. But you change stuff enough, get too far from the source material, and you are "(insert popular IP name here)" in name only.

MWO is not that far from getting ther.e

Stoned Prophet, on 21 April 2015 - 08:12 AM, said:

None of those things are caused by quirks. People did ALL those things LONG before quirks. So no, quirks are not the culprit of making this game "less BT like".
Way to cop out. No, i think you know you used wild hyperbole and are to proud to admit it.
Let me list the ways you (probably) think it changes things based on quirks:
1. Cooldown: Doesnt matter, as TT is 10 sec turns.
2. Range: Really? Oh no they can go farther! No.
3. Heat: If we already had a TT like heat scale, maybe, but since we dont, nope.
4. Armor/Structure buff: This actually makes the game MORE like TT, as it increases time to kill.

If you have any others youd like me to shoot down, hit me with em. Too bored to go through every quirk and prove your hillary level of hyperbole.

Bishop Steiner, on 21 April 2015 - 08:12 AM, said:

now who's copping out?

Stoned Prophet, on 21 April 2015 - 08:15 AM, said:

Ah, yes, asking which things in particular you are talking about is "copping out" says the guy who cant answer a straight question
Why all trolly this morning Bish? Need some coffee so you can make ACTUAL arguments? I mean, usually you are well reasoned and articulate. Seems like youre phoning this one in. What gives?

Yeah, Just cant handle when someone sees through your "wittiness" eh? Thats sad. Nope, quirks are fine, you just needed something to whine about it seems. Have fun with that!

[Bishop Steiner]

Stoned Prophet, on 22 April 2015 - 10:12 AM, said:

Yeah, Just cant handle when someone sees through your "wittiness" eh? Thats sad. Nope, quirks are fine, you just needed something to whine about it seems. Have fun with that!

Nope just not wasting time on someone whose only intent is to be a roadblock. Pretty obvious from the other responses that most of them get it. In all honestly, could care less what you think about it. But please reply so you can have the last word and feel better about yourself. Then the rest of us can actually continue to have a useful discussion.

[Senor Cataclysmo]

I just don't know if its possible to reconcile TT armour/internal/damage values with precision shooting mechanics.

The canon armour & structure values were written with randomly determining which location takes hits in mind, not being able to aim for specific components...

It's easy to say 'no chassis should need 50% quirks to be viable', and in an ideal world, they wouldn't, but that's the consequence of porting the stats of a dice based TT game directly into a first person shooter. Plus let's not forget battle value. Even in TT it was acknowledged that some mechs were simply better than others.

Do you want a game that allows players to aim and rewards absolute precision or a game that is all about modelling TT mechanics to the letter? Because you can't have both. I know no-one wants to hear that, but there it is.

My first instinct for a fix would be to just scrap TT values altogether. Just adjust what each mech needs on an individual basis until it 'feels' right, and hang the damn TT values. Given a choice between an Atlas that has stats that make it tanky, tough and terrifying in the amount of punishment it can take, or an Atlas that preserves TT values exactly but reacts to precision laser fire like it's made of chocolate & dogshit I know which one I'd choose.

Who cares about the actual numbers as long as it feels right, right? We wouldn't even need quirks. Instead of 'this mech needs an unexplained 50% buff to even remotely feel like it should', it would be 'this mech has the base stats that make it feel like it should'.

Edited by Senor Cataclysmo, 22 April 2015 - 11:02 AM.

[Artgathan]

Some interesting places to start differentiating mechs without the use of quirks:

• Max armor as a function of stock armor (where the cap on the armor is +X% of the stock armor instead of the current values which are based on mech tonnage)
  
• Decoupling overall mobility from engine size
  
• Giving bonuses to ammo stored in stock locations (extra rounds/ton for example)
  
• Different skill trees for mechs
  
• Skill-based crits (for instance, requiring pilots to hit the weapon model)

I'm not saying all of these are necessary (or even good ideas), I'm just pointing out that there are lots of ways to go about promoting variety (and 'character') of mechs without a quirk system. For instance, the ammo bonuses would force pilots to make decisions when putting ammo in the mechs (instead of 'head then legs'). Armor quirks would make pilots choose between different roles (fire support vs brawling). Different skill trees would enhance specialization. Decoupling mobility from raw engine size would reduce the 'go big or go home' engine mentality.

[FupDup]

Artgathan, on 22 April 2015 - 12:08 PM, said:

• Max armor as a function of stock armor (where the cap on the armor is +X% of the stock armor instead of the current values which are based on mech tonnage)

The problem with armor caps is that stock mechs with low armor like the Jagermech, Locust 1M, Kit Fox, Mist Lynx, Cicada, Jenner, Victor, Gargoyle, Summoner, Hellbringer, Vindicator, Blackjack, etc. get smashed down into the ground, while mechs with high stock armor don't get hurt at all. I'm also going to mention that "three certain offending Clan mechs" coincidentally come with their optimal armor stock...

Armor is king in Battletech; The most efficient weapons per ton can't match the efficiency of armor even with 1x armor values in TT. Having more armor is an upgrade to having less armor, not a tradeoff. 1 ton of armor is always better than 1 ton of guns, it's not a choice. The most min-maxed mechs use max armor or something close to max for this reason.

Maths:
TT Standard Armor: 16 points per ton
Current most efficient IS weapon per ton: Small Laser, 6 damage per ton

That makes armor 167% more efficient than the most efficient IS weapon. For Clans, the ER Small Laser reduces the gap a bit, but armor still wins in the end (standard armor is 60% more efficient than the Clan ER Small).

IS and Clan Ferro have even better efficiency per ton than that. The most weight-efficient weapon that I know of in all of BT is the Heavy Small Laser, which gives 14 damage per ton. It still slightly loses to armor. If we factor in MWO's doubled armor, these ratios get even less favorable.

[Artgathan]

FupDup, on 22 April 2015 - 12:19 PM, said:

The problem with armor caps is that stock mechs with low armor like the Jagermech, Locust 1M, Kit Fox, Mist Lynx, Cicada, Jenner, Victor, Gargoyle, Summoner, Hellbringer, Vindicator, Blackjack, etc. get smashed down into the ground, while mechs with high stock armor don't get hurt at all. I'm also going to mention that "three certain offending Clan mechs" coincidentally come with their optimal armor stock...

Armor is king in Battletech; The most efficient weapons per ton can't match the efficiency of armor even with 1x armor values in TT. Having more armor is an upgrade to having less armor, not a tradeoff. 1 ton of armor is always better than 1 ton of guns, it's not a choice. The most min-maxed mechs use max armor or something close to max for this reason.

Maths:
TT Standard Armor: 16 points per ton
Current most efficient IS weapon per ton: Small Laser, 6 damage per ton

That makes armor 167% more efficient than the most efficient IS weapon. For Clans, the ER Small Laser reduces the gap a bit, but armor still wins in the end (standard armor is 60% more efficient than the Clan ER Small).

IS and Clan Ferro have even better efficiency per ton than that. The most weight-efficient weapon that I know of in all of BT is the Heavy Small Laser, which gives 14 damage per ton. It still slightly loses to armor. If we factor in MWO's doubled armor, these ratios get even less favorable.

Oh I agree armor is king in bt and that ton for ton armor is the best thing you can mount on your mech. Like I said, I don't think this is necessarily the best way to go about differentiating mechs, but it is a way to do it. Some of the mechs you named as example though (the Vindicator, with the AA being an exception, and Blackjack) would benefit from the system as they're heavily armored for their size (both carry more armor stock than a Jagermech, and there's only ~2 tons difference between them and a Victor). However all this really does is serve to highlight the weapon/armor imbalance in MW:O (where the first thing you do is max out a mech's armor and then think about adding weapons).

[FupDup]

Artgathan, on 22 April 2015 - 12:35 PM, said:

Oh I agree armor is king in bt and that ton for ton armor is the best thing you can mount on your mech. Like I said, I don't think this is necessarily the best way to go about differentiating mechs, but it is a way to do it. Some of the mechs you named as example though (the Vindicator, with the AA being an exception, and Blackjack) would benefit from the system as they're heavily armored for their size (both carry more armor stock than a Jagermech, and there's only ~2 tons difference between them and a Victor). However all this really does is serve to highlight the weapon/armor imbalance in MW:O (where the first thing you do is max out a mech's armor and then think about adding weapons).

MWO didn't create the weapon/armor imbalance, it inherited it. Anytime I make a custom mech in SSW I always hit efficient maximum armor after putting in my engine size. I might sometimes take off half a ton of armor to remove decimals in pod space (I'm OCD about that), but otherwise I'm gonna go close to max. Never under 90% for sure.

[Artgathan]

FupDup, on 22 April 2015 - 12:43 PM, said:

MWO didn't create the weapon/armor imbalance, it inherited it. Anytime I make a custom mech in SSW I always hit efficient maximum armor after putting in my engine size. I might sometimes take off half a ton of armor to remove decimals in pod space (I'm OCD about that), but otherwise I'm gonna go close to max. Never under 90% for sure.

Aye, but just because MW:O inherited the imbalance doesn't mean that nothing should be done to correct it. I also run 90%+ armor most of the time (most of it forward-facing, for other reasons), and I seriously doubt that there exists a significant number of players who don't.

Situations like this are just a shame because it removes choice from the game.