20 replies to this topic

[Onmyoudo]

I just bought the Sparky and 3M Griffins, and have found that they're exactly what I wanted the Quickdraw to be when it first came out.

At 55 tons, Griffins are agile, nimble, speedy missile/laser boats with decent jump capability and enough hitbox/twist capability to not die instantly.

At 60 tons, Quickdraws are sluggish, clumsy, slower missile/laser boats with okayish jump capability and awful hitboxes and scaling.

Also, let's be honest, the Griffin even looks cooler.

My question is: why? There is 5 tons difference between these two mechs, and both have been arguably designed to perform the role of a laser/missile speed striker (although QKD has more energy and GRF has more missiles). Both have jumpjets, although QKD gets shafted on the class IIIs because it's a "heavy". There's only a 10kph speed difference. Yet the QKD is a worse mech to play and laughable to play against, and that is reflected by the fact nobody uses them.

PGI is doing a "total rebalance" of sorts. These are the kind of questions they need to ask themselves. How can you have two similar role mechs within 5 tons of each other be so radically different in usefulness? Why would anybody ever take a QKD over a GRF when the latter is so superior? How are you, as the developers, going to differentiate these mechs - without leaving one completely in the dust, as you did in your first iteration?

Thoughts and suggestions in this thread!

[Spheroid]

I would take Quickdraws in the current meta quite frankly. The 3M is junk, nothing good on that chassis nowdays.

[Juodas Varnas]

As a Quickdraw pilot, i can say that the only reason to use Quickdraw over anything else, is if you're a masochist or really, i mean REALLY like the way it looks.

I'm probably the former, hahaha, because even though i *like* how it looks, i think it looks like absolute bollocks when compared to its concept art. (it lost all its sleekness, small agile feet, nice looking arms and became a huge wide box with gorilla arms and snow shoes)

But yeah, Quickdraw is oversized, has pretty crap hitboxes (the arms are pretty good at shielding though) and is also cursed with the LARGE movement archetype (which it shares with mechs like 80 ton Awesome, Victor and the 85 ton Stalker), which makes it extremely terrible at moving even at slightest inclines.
It's also pretty hardpoint starved for a heavy mech and suffers from very low slung (and wide apart) arms.

Edited by Juodas Varnas, 28 June 2015 - 12:42 AM.

[Spheroid]

^tanks like a beast and the chest hardpoints are high. What's the problem again?

[Juodas Varnas]

Spheroid, on 28 June 2015 - 12:42 AM, said:

^tanks like a beast and the chest hardpoints are high. What's the problem again?

It doesn't tank like a beast. It's a 60 tonner with armor that's more comparable to Medium mechs than Heavy mechs, but the size larger than 80 ton assault mechs.

It tanks like wet tissue paper.

[zagibu]

The problem is mostly the scaling. Compare it to an EBJ, and you really wonder how it's possible that the EBJ should be 5t heavier. If it was 10-20% scaled down overall, it could be a good mech with the current quirks. Unfortunately, PGI has stated in the past that an overall scaling like that is not as simple as it sounds (not really sure why, but hey, what do I know?).

[Yosharian]

The question is not if OP is correct (anyone with a functioning brain can see that he is) the question is why has it taken PGI so long to understand this problem and take steps to solve it.

[Soy]

quickdraw is a chunky **** of a mech in this game

you wanna talk about a knuckledragger mech, holy ****

only time i seen worse turf shots is the women's world cup heyooooooooooooooooo

[Juodas Varnas]

Soy, on 28 June 2015 - 01:01 AM, said:

quickdraw is a chunky **** of a mech in this game

you wanna talk about a knuckledragger mech, holy ****

only time i seen worse turf shots is the women's world cup heyooooooooooooooooo

The modelers really butchered Alex's concept on that one.

Might be the absolute worst concept - 3d model transition of all mechs.


You can clearly see how much it got shafted. The torso looks like it was stretched horizontally, the feet are ginormous in comparison and the arms... The bloody arms... They're like twice as large and if you look at the shoulder joint, you can clearly see that they seem misplaced - too far from the torso.
The stance is awkward, squat, with the legs set diagonally, making it look like it has weak knees.
You can't see from this picture, but she also has her Jump jet ports ****** up. 5 ports (2 in each side torso and 1 in CT), but the one in CT isn't functioning.

Edited by Juodas Varnas, 28 June 2015 - 01:18 AM.

[martian]

I quite like the Quickdraw in BattleTech. Not especially powerful 'Mech, I know, but it has got a low BV. Useful for hunting enemy light 'Mechs which it shares movement profile with, while having more powerful armament and stronger armor.

QKD-5A is actually quite useful in 3025 era games, thanks its combination of low BV and focused weaponry.

And before you ask:
QKD-9M Quickdraw is my favorite variant .... unfortunately I will have to wait a few years to get it.


And Quickdraw in MWO?
It suffers from:

• huge size for its weight
  
• unsuitable movement archetype
  
• bad hitboxes
  
• reputation for being an easy kill that - together with those three aforementioned points - makes it a prime target of all enemy players (the Awesome has got a similar problem)
  
• uninteresting quirks (especially when compared with some ridiculously overquirked 'Mechs of similar weight)
  
• two almost identical variants (-G and -4H)
  
• almost useless Hero 'Mech (IV-Four)
  
• taking up one Heavy slot in 3/3/3/3 system (whenever I see somebody in the Quickdraw in my team, I feel sad because it means one potential Mad Cat or Cauldron-Born on our side ...)

All this added together, I can't force myself to buy the Quickdraw. It's sad because I am a FWL fan and a Quickdraw fan. But I feel that all C-Bills spent on the Quickdraw in MWO would be utterly wasted, especially if the Griffin being the other choice.

[zagibu]

The 5K works okay, if you play it from the second line, because it has pretty good quirks. But the rest...

[Narcissistic Martyr]

Quickdraw and dragon both suffer from PGI trying to balance out that they were faster than all the medium mechs available at the time by making them massive.

[Cyborne Elemental]

Quickdraw should have been illustrated as a very slender mech for its tonnage more like what we got out of the Grasshopper, Its design got horribly bloated somewhere along the line.

That tonnage difference bothered me as well, it needs to have a Medium mech's archetype and agility #'s, not a heavy mech's.

The worst part of the quickdraw IMO is the 1 ton jets, it is what makes the biggest difference between Griffin and Shadowhawk performance in comparison, because the tonnage difference is tiny, but needing 5 tons of jets to do what 2.5 tons can in SHD and GRF means they can carry equivalent firepower while still outperforming on agility.

I look at the QKD the same as I do as the Victor, a victim of its own tonnage putting it into specific Classification for agility losses, while not having very much gain in firepower over its lower tonnage equivalents.

[Bishop Steiner]

Spheroid, on 28 June 2015 - 12:42 AM, said:

^tanks like a beast and the chest hardpoints are high. What's the problem again?

about the easiest mech to leg in the game.

[Greenjulius]

I agree that the Quickdraw is hard mode. There are not real perks to taking it out.

However, I've recently leveled Griffins and found them to be lacking as well. I seem to be able to avoid death much easier in the Shad than the Griffin, as I die to side torso loss almost 100% of the time, even when twisting well. The Shad makes a great XL mech, while the Griffin probably should only be run with STD.

Just check them out. CT is smallish, while STs are huge.



Now compare to the Shadowhawk, which XL's like a boss.



For comparison, here are the horrid Quickdraw hitboxes. It's a mixed bad as well:



The Quickdraw's arm hardpoints are at leg level, while the Griffin and Shadowhawk both have higher mounted arm hardpoints. That's a major problem and a reason the current QKD will always be inferior to the chosen 55 tonners.

Edited by Greenjulius, 28 June 2015 - 01:28 PM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

zagibu, on 28 June 2015 - 12:55 AM, said:

Compare it to an EBJ, and you really wonder how it's possible that the EBJ should be 5t heavier.

Speaking of bad scaling compared to the EBJ, you should compare the Nova and the Ebon Jag, it is depressing.

[Greenjulius]

WM Quicksilver, on 28 June 2015 - 01:58 PM, said:

Speaking of bad scaling compared to the EBJ, you should compare the Nova and the Ebon Jag, it is depressing.

Here was the comparison before the stance was raised. The Ebon Jag should be a little taller now. Thanks for the comparison Navid A1!

Edited by Greenjulius, 28 June 2015 - 02:12 PM.

[Moldur]

zagibu, on 28 June 2015 - 12:55 AM, said:

The problem is mostly the scaling. Compare it to an EBJ, and you really wonder how it's possible that the EBJ should be 5t heavier. If it was 10-20% scaled down overall, it could be a good mech with the current quirks. Unfortunately, PGI has stated in the past that an overall scaling like that is not as simple as it sounds (not really sure why, but hey, what do I know?).

Superior clan lightweight materials. Something something. Engineers forgot to include said materials in the Nova or Mad dog. Cough. or something....

[Macster16]

Probably the exception here, but I prefer my QKD-5K to my Sparky. The Sparky is fragile, usually dying from an ST blowout running an XL, has lower hardpoints compared to the QKD and while its arms are good for shielding side-on, they carry 4 out of the 6 hardpoints and I often find its arms frequently being blown off and losing a good portion of its armament. But mostly though, the Sparky has NO range quirks - the 5Ks 20% range bonus on MLs makes a BIG difference and too many times I'm finding enemies out of reach of the Sparky's MLs while for the 5K, it's MLs would be able to reach out and touch that same enemy. As for hitboxes, while the QKD has a largish CT, I find it actually rolls damage better than the Griffin if you time its JJs well.

[Zordicron]

Sparky-> QKD compar-o is a different take on it I haven't seen before.

Usually people compare Quickie to a jager or Cataphract or some other sillyness.


In general, I feel PGI should work to blend the borders of the weight classes better. I know TT rules and all that stuff have always kinda dinked over the lowest tonnage of each class, but that doesnt mean PGI couldnt give some mild movement quirks to the lowbies to blend them closer to the previous class.

In QKD case, sharing movement with an Awesome is kinda lol really. On the other hand, if you put sufficient size XL in, it isn;t as bad as it looks on paper. I am ok with having a mech that works better with XL then not, we have plenty of both XL and non XL friendly mechs. I am ok with the hardpoints to be honest. But, I feel it would be nice to not force a comparitively huge engine on the mech to keep it from being a total sloth. IMO, the movement thing is part of that.

Otherwise it certainly has it's points as a chassis. I laser boated most of mine, cept the one that I ran triple LRM 10 on as a mobile LRM support mech, that was some lulz. Oh, and dual gauss IV4, that is a fun one also. I would agree with others though that it certainly a pilot's mech. But, they can't all be EZcrows can they.