61 replies to this topic

[Wolf Clearwater]

Increasing time to kill is good for the game. The current rate this is set at is ridiculous. Should all the weapon quirks go? Probably not, but overall this is a good first pass. Bring back tiny weapon quirks, nothing more that 5-10% max when stacked.

The sensor changes are the right way to go. Not sure I am sold totally on the ranges yet, but a good start. Scouting should be a valid role, not just mindless weapon key mashing. This is not CoD with robots.

Good start PGI, I would like to see what comes next.

See below for rabid frothing at the mouth, I am sure there will be plenty.

[Struan]

Amen to that! Enough of this arms race crap, this is never what Mechwarrior was supposed to be.

[KraftySOT]

I agree but, also disagree.

I agree with the sentiment, but the fact is that 50% faster rate of fire for an LB10X on an Orion, was not exactly a game changer.

100% wouldnt have made it any better. A non quirked, no basics, TW, can still core an Orion, LONG before an LB10 with twice the rate of fire is going to core a TW. Even with the other quirks, and other weapons, on an Orion.

Infact most of the "huge inflated quirks" made mechs that were terrible, less terrible, but not competitive. The Thud was over done. The Stalker 4N probably was too. Maybe still is. But those are the mechs that got the 10-20% ones. Not the massive ones.

The ones that got massive quirks, were utterly useless before. Does anyone remember the Huginn BEFORE it became an SRM machine? Nope me either.

Infact most quirks didnt go far enough.

But the more you quirk, the more TTK goes down. But its an illusion, since for 4-8 mechs, the TTK was ALWAYS this low, and will ALWAYS be this low unless you nerf them.

Raising everyone to the level of TWs, Wubshees, and Direwhales, wrecked TTK, but youre not fixing anything by making every mech in the game equally bad compared to the holy trinity. All you do is convince people never to play anything but the holy trinity, just like before quirks.

Some mechs need way more love than quirks alone can provide, or they need truly outrageously huge quirks.

A Vindicator that can shoot PPCs three times as fast for half the heat, would finally make it competitive with a Doomcrow. And nothing short of that is going to make it worth dropping for any thing other than "fun times".

But as said, then if you do that for every mech, TTK suffers.

Its a really tough spot to be in. Being that all there is to do is shoot each others gundams, if you want "balance" that means every single mech pretty much has the exact same DPS and Alphas. They may get there in different ways...but you cant have an Orion that does 41 damage, all of it spread but medium lasers, compete against a TW that does 65, with Gauss and Med lasers.

It doesnt work.

It keeps going around in circles. If you make the Orion do 65 damage so it can take on a TW, then everyones TTK goes down. If you leave it alone. TTK for the TW is fine, TTK for the Orion is horrible.

People freak out when you say this...but...the only real option to keep TTK high, to live longer, is to make it so the TW can only do 41 damage. Not buffing the Orion. Nerfing the TW.

I hate to say that too because that sucks. But thats really the only option. The "nuclear" option if you will. Its not pleasant, it pisses people off, especially people who love their TWs, money and #winning, but...faced with the options of super low TTK for everyone, or super low TTK for whoever goes up against the MetaMechs...what else is there?

Edited by KraftySOT, 12 September 2015 - 06:17 PM.

[KursedVixen]

Wolf Clearwater, on 12 September 2015 - 05:42 PM, said:

Increasing time to kill is good for the game. The current rate this is set at is ridiculous. Should all the weapon quirks go? Probably not, but overall this is a good first pass. Bring back tiny weapon quirks, nothing more that 5-10% max when stacked.

The sensor changes are the right way to go. Not sure I am sold totally on the ranges yet, but a good start. Scouting should be a valid role, not just mindless weapon key mashing. This is not CoD with robots.

Good start PGI, I would like to see what comes next.

See below for rabid frothing at the mouth, I am sure there will be plenty.

I think weapon quirks are okay on mechs that need or would have them a good example is the Warhawk or Nova the nova really needs those laser quirks it helps the warhawk also probably needs the ERPPC quirks ,however these quirks need to be small enough that it just gives it a slight edge over a mech that does not have the quirks. It should not prevent overheating ,but make it less likely in that mech.

Also I think the timberwolf and stormcrow laser quirks are bad.

and I fully agree increasing death time is very good this isn't call of duty or Hawken. Battltech is an extremly slow game so you shouldn't be able to kill a mech that has full armor and structure, barring the unlikely and Rare cockpit shot I guess i'd take the sensor changes over laser cooldown, duration nerfs. and yeah scouting needs to be an actual thing Scout mechs were built with one thing in mind. Find the enemy relay their positon run away. Their weapon loadouts are only meant for point defence , though I still see swarming slower mechs with a few lights as a valid tactic, THe locust and Dasher for example weren't built to take damage their armor was in the speed. Run fast don't be killed stand around be killed yes true a guass rifle can take out a locust in one shot ,but it would be the locust fault for standing around too long.

Edited by KursedVixen, 12 September 2015 - 06:23 PM.

[Wolf Clearwater]

I am sure after a bit, another pass will have to be made for some of the mechs. Guessing MLX, LCT, and maybe some of the larger ones as well (looking at you Orions). As was stated above not all the weapon quirks were terrible. I am suggesting ramp things up incrementally from a smaller base for weapons quirks. And yes, I bought my Hugin before it was an SRM 4 monster, so I remember.

[Rebas Kradd]

KraftySOT, on 12 September 2015 - 06:10 PM, said:

Its a really tough spot to be in.

It really isn't. Just nerf lasers through heat. Make them hot. That one change would open up worlds of balance.

[Gas Guzzler]

Rebas Kradd, on 12 September 2015 - 06:25 PM, said:

It really isn't. Just nerf lasers through heat. Make them hot. That one change would open up worlds of balance.

RIP Black Knight

Waste of ******* money, mech completely ruined.

Yay.

[KraftySOT]

Rebas Kradd, on 12 September 2015 - 06:25 PM, said:

It really isn't. Just nerf lasers through heat. Make them hot. That one change would open up worlds of balance.

That helps, but it doesnt make the Vindicator anybetter, and it doesnt make 2 Gauss + 4ERML (firing slightly slower) any less devastating. The Orion still dies to the TW way more often than not, and always loses 1 on 1s with pilots being relatively equal.

Unfortunately you cant just change one thing, and make it all better.

Everyone wants there to be one single cause and solution. Thats just how human beings are. But in reality, theres no ONE single motive for any action taken in the world, or one SINGLE cause for any event or problem.

Its a massively interconnected shitshow. Life. And balancing 250 mech variants so none of them are terribad, but TTK isnt to low.

You could also, triple everyones rate of fire on ALL weapons. That is to say, make them three times as slow. So all yer weapons pretty much fire once every 10 seconds.

TTK goes up. But you havent balanced anything really.

[Thorqemada]

In case of the Atlas D - increasing TTK by makeing it increased Zombi-Lifespan is not a good way to increase fun.

Clan Mechs would get a big boon of all the Structure Quirlks bcs many of them have the main armament in the arms and their light and lowslotcount weaponry will last much longer but the IS that has many Mechs with the main armament in the Sidetorsi filled with heavy highslotcount weapons - it is a big disadvantage and will only increase Zombi-Lifespan.

Not a good deal!

Edited by Thorqemada, 12 September 2015 - 06:45 PM.

[KraftySOT]

Gas Guzzler, on 12 September 2015 - 06:33 PM, said:

RIP Black Knight

Waste of ******* money, mech completely ruined.

Yay.

And the Nova, Wubshee, Wubstarter, Hunchie P, Grasshopper...

Theres clearly a better solution than just making lasers hotter. Which is effectively what was done by taking away every heat quirk in the game (the locust i think still has -5% probably by accident).

Those can certainly stay gone on the LoveboatsofWubvomit, but were going to need to go through literally every mech in the game, and figure out how to balance that mech, around all the other mechs.

Its not just a case of, youre 45 tons and im 45 tons and we should be equal, but better than all the 40 tonners and not as good as all the 50 tonners. Thats just not going to work. And it wont ever be that way even if you try. Other factors will always make an Arctic Cheetah better than a Vindicator. Unless you specifically make a Vindicator, better than an Arctic Cheetah.

But now the Vindicator is way better than the enforcer.

So you gotta buff the enforcer.

Well crap. There goes TTK again.

You need to target the source of the problem. Which is the mechs that are wrecking face ALL the time. The Holy Trinity and a few others.

[MischiefSC]

I like the sensor changes overall. Plenty of room to 'tweak' but I do like it.

I like increased TTK, for IS vs IS it's actually pretty awesome.

So long as we view these changes not as an impending patch but just a show model for the ideas I'm happy with that.

The problem comes with the fear of this stuff going the route of other PTS runs and ending up live with minimal change in spite of huge objections. Like the original Clan stuff.

[MechaBattler]

I agree. But it feels like they balanced around only 3 points of what Paul talked about. We need the 4th point to be addressed individually as well. In the form of weapon quirks for firepower. But it doesn't feel like they're doing a balanced approach. Some variants get performance heavy quirks. Then seemingly arbitrarily another variant gets heavy structure quirks. Instead of all being used. It feel like they're trying to pigeon hole variants into a vague role. Without the use of firepower quirks. And sometimes it doesn't make sense.

[Livewyr]

Infotech is kind of pointless, courtesy of ECM.

ECM stealth meant:
LRMs too unreliable to bring, use Directfire.
Using directfire means use your eyes. Soo... Info tech is a useless facet.. because ECM nuked info warfare. (And is still pulsing...)

[Mystere]

KraftySOT, on 12 September 2015 - 06:10 PM, said:

It keeps going around in circles. If you make the Orion do 65 damage so it can take on a TW, then everyones TTK goes down. If you leave it alone. TTK for the TW is fine, TTK for the Orion is horrible.

People freak out when you say this...but...the only real option to keep TTK high, to live longer, is to make it so the TW can only do 41 damage. Not buffing the Orion. Nerfing the TW.

I hate to say that too because that sucks. But thats really the only option. The "nuclear" option if you will. Its not pleasant, it pisses people off, especially people who love their TWs, money and #winning, but...faced with the options of super low TTK for everyone, or super low TTK for whoever goes up against the MetaMechs...what else is there?

As I said in other threads, it's time to reconsider formations involving Stars vs. Lances, not this 12 vs. 12 stuff. Otherwise, Mech A = Mech B will be the only logical conclusion, with everything differing only in shape, color, and sound effects. But by then we might was well stop referring to Battletech and Mechwarrior.

Edited by Mystere, 12 September 2015 - 07:17 PM.

[MischiefSC]

Mystere, on 12 September 2015 - 07:14 PM, said:

As I said in other threads, it's time to reconsider formations involving Stars vs. Lances, not this 12 vs. 12 stuff. Otherwise, Mech A = Mech B will be the only logical conclusion, with everything differing only in shape, color, and sound effects. But by then we might was well stop referring to Battletech and Mechwarrior.

As soon as everyone controls a group of mechs and not just one and combat is resolved by dice rolls to hit, that'd work great.

If you want an FPS though and each player to 1 mech, unless you have some means of controlling how many players go to drop in which mech format (Clan/IS) and can change the fundamental human drives related to short-term reward vs long term success, especially in something with a game in which they are only mildly invested, we're going to have to give that one a pass.

[Commissar Aku]

Livewyr, on 12 September 2015 - 07:10 PM, said:

Infotech is kind of pointless, courtesy of ECM.

ECM stealth meant:
LRMs too unreliable to bring, use Directfire.
Using directfire means use your eyes. Soo... Info tech is a useless facet.. because ECM nuked info warfare. (And is still pulsing...)

BAP? tag? Using spotters and team work is OP. You should try it sometime instead of crying about overpowered systems that are only overpowered if you are an alpha firing ******* and/or CoDpiece.

[Astrocanis]

Commissar Aku, on 13 September 2015 - 06:08 AM, said:

BAP? tag? Using spotters and team work is OP. You should try it sometime instead of crying about overpowered systems that are only overpowered if you are an alpha firing ******* and/or CoDpiece.

Enforce teamwork and you have a point. Otherwise you are merely being insulting. The moment you enforce teamwork, there will be fallout.

Everybody that played an MMO had fun. Not everyone that played an MMO raided (group play). If you want to enforce raiding, then you'll lose those that don't. In the meantime, please try to be civil. If you had a point, you lost it the moment you went negative.

[edit] So, who is going to sign up for a less lucrative style of play? Any volunteers?

To make infowar even marginally useful, they need to build other game infrastructure to support it.

1. In the current game, how do you maximize C-Bills and XP? They need to totally rework that.
2. In the current game, does PSR take into account the weight class, chassis or role of the mech?
3. In the current game, are there any pilot skills related to info or role warfare?
4. In the current game, are there any modules besides ECM/Radar Derp that are effective? There are 3: which ones would you say are effective enough to be desirable?
5. In the current game, is the terrain varied enough to make infowar/scouting useful? If so, why is scouting so rare? (see question 1).

Until these, and probably several more, are at least recognized if not outright addressed, infowars in stillborn.

Edited by Astrocanis, 13 September 2015 - 06:25 AM.

[SpiralFace]

KraftySOT, on 12 September 2015 - 06:46 PM, said:

You need to target the source of the problem. Which is the mechs that are wrecking face ALL the time. The Holy Trinity and a few others.

I think people are too blinded by the lack of weapon quirks on the IS side to look in on what the clan side has been doing. And its going to be a game changer.

On the clan side, you now have CT's condone a huge wall of penelties. These penelties are off set by buffs provided by the other omnipods.

Omnipod has no hard points in it, You get tons of buffs to offset the core CT piece. Have one or two weapon systems in a low slung state, Healthy amount of buffs. A few good hard points in good placement spots, nothing but the hard points. Large amount of high mounts, large amounts of hard points, large amount of hard point + JJ's, MORE nerfs.

So if you try to go "full meta" with clans, in MOST cases, you actually get hit pretty hard with mobility / info nerfs.

Sadly, you don't hear that from the clan side, you hear about the complaining that EVERYONE GOT BUFFS when the reality was that a few of them are borked, and some of them will need readjustment.

Next time its up, take a look at the storm crow, or the Ebon Jaguar. Most of the big "meta" builds got hit with a ton of mobility nerfs.

Which again, goes into what I think they are really trying to go for with these tests. They want a BASELINE of what FAIR mobility, protection, and info tech quirks look IN COMPARISON to firepower quirks (the known quantity.)

Might mean we still get firepower quriks in the end, but it looks like right now, they are trying to figure out what MEANINGFUL quirks in the other 3 pillars look like, since firepower is such a known quantity to us right now.

[Mechsniper]

Negative penalties are bs. They are not a valid method of "balance". Balancing the weapons heat/damage/cooldown is the best bet without fixing the real problem(hardpoint size limits or lack thereof). Quirks were a doomed idea from the start.

[Mawai]

I agree with the sentiment of the OP but I disagree that the current implementation is actually a good first step.

Goals
- enhanced role warfare
- balance between mechs ... variants, chassis, tonnage, clan and IS

PGI method
- create a table of 4 factors - Firepower, protection, movement and infotech
- balance mechs around these 4 factors so that mechs have strengths and weaknesses in each category.

This sounds great on paper. However, the biggest problem is that the categories are not equal. Movement and Infotech are situational. They depend on the mech, the build and the combat circumstances as to whether they are worth something or nothing in terms of how a game plays out. On the other hand, firepower and protection are ALWAYS useful. There is no situation in mechwarrior where additional protection is not useful or where additional firepower is not useful.

Mechs with strengths in firepower or protection have an innate advantage over mechs with equivalent tonnage with strengths in movement or infotech. Infotech quirks will have the greatest impact only on weapons that require a lock to be effective ... LRMs and SSRMs. All other weapon systems can and are fired directly at the target and do not require a lock or more detailed targeting information to be effective. Almost everyone has played with the prevalence of ECM recently. This is equivalent to playing with 100% negative infotech quirks ... and it makes little or no difference in the effectiveness of individual mechs or mechs moving as a group.

The bottom line is that you can never use infotech advantages to balance firepower or protection advantages unless the reductions in firepower/protection to obtain the infotech quirks are so small as to relatively meaningless. This is true for MWO as it currently stands with currently available game modes.

Similarly, movement advantages are generally meaningless unless really significant. The 280% torso twist speed increase on one of the mechs on PTS is an example of a large increase in agility. However, this won't effectively spread damage unless the loadout is designed to take advantage of it, dual gauss for example. Clan ERLL or Clan ACs require longer face time to target so that mech is still vulnerable when firing. As a result, a general protection buff like that on the Atlas-D (huge structure buffs) might be more useful. In addition, increased speed is really only effective when the increase is large. Increasing an assault mech from 50 to 60 or 55 to 70 makes it a bit more maneuverable but it isn't the same as a 5% firepower increase which is usefull all the time, against all opponents in all situations.

So, although I think PGI is moving in the right direction with the idea of a mech rebalance, I think the values they have chosen so far and the weightings that they are applying to the different factors don't appear to be effectively meeting the goals.

Finally, the entire reason that IS mechs were quirked so much was to try to balance clan and IS weapons. Clan weapons are more effective than IS weapons. Unless PGI bites the bullet and addresses the fundamental clan/IS balance issues ... there is no way that they will be able to balance all the mechs,