200 replies to this topic

[Baba Yogi]

pbiggz, on 07 October 2015 - 06:48 AM, said:

Iv played this game since closed beta and iv played with alot of people and not one of them ever told me they LIKE how big mediums are, but MANY told me how much they HATE how big mediums are.

Ppl usually dont say how content they are, that is the medium. When there seems to be a percieved problem then they talk about it. Why do you think forums are flooded with problems this or that kind of posts? Unless the game itself has done something extraordinarily good then you wont hear positive comments.

Let me be the one of the many content ppl, i love the size of mediums, they are just right.

[Talynn DeRaa]

The Crab is just a preview of what PGI intends to do with Mechwarrior Online. Its quirks are in line with the new system they wish to implement, where some IS mechs have minor weapon quirks, with a heavier focus on mobility, and armor (InfoTech still pending). This, hand in hand with those quirks, also shows their desired change of scale of the mechs as well.

Soon, we'll likely be seeing properly sized Novas, Centurions, and a variety of other mechs in the medium and heavy classes getting a proper rescaling.

Edited by Talynn DeRaa, 07 October 2015 - 06:58 AM.

[Speedy Plysitkos]

Ghogiel, on 07 October 2015 - 06:53 AM, said:

Bunch of slack jawed crabbabies around here

Hey, you photographed my 2nd Mauler pilot there....

Edited by Titannium, 07 October 2015 - 07:03 AM.

[Livewyr]

Titannium, on 07 October 2015 - 06:43 AM, said:

So clanners do not admit that they have some OP (ach im looking to you, and tbr to you also) mechs. They must BITCHING about one IS solid mech we got....

1: I agree that the ACH is too strong.
2: That's not what this thread is about.
3: Rather than acknowledge that the Crab is much too small, you refer to OP Clan mechs in order to deflect that overpowered defensive nature of the Crab.

And the Spheroids wonder why the clans pay little mind to their *****ing about OP mechs. You're not sad about the balance being off, you're just sad that the balance isn't off in YOUR favor.

Crab is much too small for 50 ton mech. It's practically Jenner Sized.

[MeiSooHaityu]

Livewyr, on 07 October 2015 - 06:40 AM, said:

Yeah.. NO. It is officially much too small.


I consider the Shadowcat to be roughly a good size. This is a close up view of the Crab from my Shadowcat cockpit.

Note that the cockpit is looking *down* (you can see by the elevation indicator on the either side of the crosshair)

Legs man...legs. The Crab sits lower because the legs are longer on the Cicada and Shadow Cat then they are on the Crab. The torso is about the same height (where really the tonnage should matter).

Here is the Cicada, Shadow Cat, and Hunchback...


Here is the Cicada and the Crab from the comparison video...


Yes the torso on the Cicada and Shadow Cat sit higher because the legs and hips are taller, but the torso is about the same height (again with the corners "shoulders) of the Cicada being broader.

Again, I don't think this is as far off as you think, and POV perspective isn't telling the whole story. That is unless the Crab is magically shrinking from Mechbay to in-game.

[Speedy Plysitkos]

Livewyr, on 07 October 2015 - 07:08 AM, said:

1: I agree that the ACH is too strong.
2: That's not what this thread is about.
3: Rather than acknowledge that the Crab is much too small, you refer to OP Clan mechs in order to deflect that overpowered defensive nature of the Crab.

And the Spheroids wonder why the clans pay little mind to their *****ing about OP mechs. You're not sad about the balance being off, you're just sad that the balance isn't off in YOUR favor.

Crab is much too small for 50 ton mech. It's practically Jenner Sized.

1) you are doing like, there isnt any unbalanced ACH/TBR mech (in your favor)
2) you are pointing one and mybe only one IS mech, that has correct size in mediums, but hey, MY OP ACH and TBR are not OP enough now. Cant hit that thing now.... NERFF.

laughable.

Edited by Titannium, 07 October 2015 - 07:18 AM.

[Baba Yogi]

MeiSooHaityu, on 07 October 2015 - 06:47 AM, said:

Just food for thought, isn't that the same for a lot of mechs (if not all of them)?

A Cicada for instance has higher mounted weapons (basically cockpit level) that makes it a good hill poker. The same could be said for the Hunchback and Shadow Hawk with their heavy hitting firepower up high. By playing a certain position, they can use terrain or buildings to hide a large portion of their torso from fire. Compound this with the Cicada's light mech speed and manuverability, hill humping and poking is quick and make it hard to hit. So, by playing a certain way, these mechs can hide their flaws or vulnerabilities.

Now the Crab's main weapons are low mounted. The arms hang far lower and the CT energy is at the bottom of the torso just above the hip. The only high mounted weapon is one head laser limited to a MPLaser or smaller. The Crab (in theory) has to expose more of it's small profile to fire it's main weapons. To that effect, maybe the mech should have a small forward profile to make up for it's low slung hardpoints and inability to hill hump/poke.

in any case, this game is all about knowing your mech and playing a position that helps eliminate it's weaknesses. that is part of being effective with any mech. That is a core part of the game really.

We try to go around those weaknesses since every mech is designed from original artwork. But my stance is that size/siluette should not be a balancing factor, that is not a good way to buff/nerf a mech. Though i'll say this , without its size crab has nothing special in terms of hardpoints or quirks. Only other advantage is its engine cap which seriously puts this guy to flanker med/long range mech. Personally i'd try 2erlarge with some mediums as backup + fast engine like 300 or somethin. If it had ERPPC quirks though **shiver**

[zagibu]

[edit]The data below is unfortunately not really accurate, because the mechs are made from overlapping parts, and the volume measured doesn't remove this overlapping space. The same thing applies for surface area as well, because hidden surfaces are counted, too.[/edit]

Here is some data I extracted from the game models by using the NeuroMorph Toolkit addon for Blender:



As you can see, the Crab has a smaller volume than all other medium mechs, however, it's still much more voluminous than a Raven.

Spoiler

Here is the text (didn't manage to align properly):

Raven 550.5489866232 98.8096264457
Crab 758.9547283455 149.3568865063
Cicada 782.7011830193 168.9651143839
Blackjack 880.1774743373 168.7722013022
Hunchback 757.7846339652 171.7266517645

Edited by zagibu, 07 October 2015 - 01:38 PM.

[Livewyr]

MeiSooHaityu, on 07 October 2015 - 07:10 AM, said:

Legs man...legs. The Crab sits lower because the legs are longer on the Cicada and Shadow Cat then they are on the Crab. The torso is about the same height (where really the tonnage should matter).

Here is the Cicada, Shadow Cat, and Hunchback...


Here is the Cicada and the Crab from the comparison video...


Yes the torso on the Cicada and Shadow Cat sit higher because the legs and hips are taller, but the torso is about the same height (again with the corners "shoulders) of the Cicada being broader.

Again, I don't think this is as far off as you think, and POV perspective isn't telling the whole story. That is unless the Crab is magically shrinking from Mechbay to in-game.

The legs are definitely part of why it's too small. The other part is the thin torso.

Can you add the Crab next to your line-up of the CDA, SHC, and HBK? (I don't have the mech.)
And then, let us remember that we are talking about a 50 ton mech... (while we compare it to the 45ton SHC and the 40 ton CDA)

[Tennex]

Livewyr, on 07 October 2015 - 06:40 AM, said:

Yeah.. NO. It is officially much too small.


I consider the Shadowcat to be roughly a good size. This is a close up view of the Crab from my Shadowcat cockpit.

Note that the cockpit is looking *down* (you can see by the elevation indicator on the either side of the crosshair)

been trying to tell people its small. They wont see what is directly in front of their eyes

[Tennex]

zagibu, on 07 October 2015 - 07:39 AM, said:

Here is some data I extracted from the game models by using the NeuroMorph Toolkit addon for Blender:



As you can see, the Crab has a smaller volume than all other medium mechs, however, it's still much more voluminous than a Raven.

Spoiler

Here is the text (didn't manage to align properly):

Raven 550.5489866232 98.8096264457
Crab 758.9547283455 149.3568865063
Cicada 782.7011830193 168.9651143839
Blackjack 880.1774743373 168.7722013022
Hunchback 757.7846339652 171.7266517645

It'd be great if we can get this data for all mechs. And i'd be glad to chart it.

Have you been able to get past the problem other people have had when attempting to get accurate mech volume?

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 01 July 2015 - 09:46 AM, said:

There is a problem in trying to test volume cubic parameters as the models are now, I "exploded" the Nova's torso in Wings to show you something that is problematic, both because you would need to close ALL pieces like this to get a good estimate, and because you would have overlapping volumes, leading to higher numbers than what it should be.

Edited by Tennex, 07 October 2015 - 07:48 AM.

[Kraftwerkedup]

This is still going on?

Bros.

The crab is the first correctly sized mech ever. Its not to small. Everything else is too big.

The Vindicator and Nova are the worst offenders.

Tennex, on 07 October 2015 - 07:43 AM, said:

been trying to tell people its small. They wont see what is directly in front of their eyes

The Shadowcat is too big.

[zagibu]

Tennex, on 07 October 2015 - 07:46 AM, said:

It'd be great if we can get this data for all mechs. And i'd be glad to chart it.

Have you been able to get past the problem other people have had when attempting to get accurate mech volume?

The neuromorph plugin automatically closes all those different objects and calculates the volume. I'm not sure if it's accurate, and it probably doesn't account for piece overlap.

[Tennex]

zagibu, on 07 October 2015 - 07:52 AM, said:

The neuromorph plugin automatically closes all those different objects and calculates the volume. I'm not sure if it's accurate, and it probably doesn't account for piece overlap.

that sounds amazing. I'd love to be able to plot all of that for science

[MeiSooHaityu]

Livewyr, on 07 October 2015 - 07:41 AM, said:

The legs are definitely part of why it's too small. The other part is the thin torso.

Can you add the Crab next to your line-up of the CDA, SHC, and HBK? (I don't have the mech.)
And then, let us remember that we are talking about a 50 ton mech... (while we compare it to the 45ton SHC and the 40 ton CDA)

The legs control overall height, but not surface area for the hitboxes. That's why I don't think leg height plays a big part. It effects more of the weapon height and POV height. If anything, taller legs mean larger leg hitboxes (and technically less things to hide behind).

Lastly, that pic shows how the true torso height is about the same as the Cicada. If it is shorter, it is by rows of pixels. What it doesn't show you is how the compare from the side. Go check out the comparison video I posted a page or so back. The Crab is longer than the Cicada. I originally thought about twice as long, but in reality it's closer to 30% longer maybe. Also as a side note, the Cicada's shields protect about half it's torso surface, the Crab has no such protection. It's whole torso I'd hanging out there to see.

Again, I'm just trying to show the Crab isn't a tiny light mech. I know I'm comparing it to a smaller medium, but most mediums are humanoid and their body type doesn't make for a compatible comparison.

I do agree that the Crab could have been a bit bigger. Maybe with the current hip height comparison, the total height or base torso height could be equal. Just remember, we are only talking a few row of pixels at this point. That is why I was just saying that this mech isn't obscenely small like some state. I'm just thinking it could be a few row of pixels larger.

There are far worse offenders out there.

[Gas Guzzler]

The Crab is a bit small for a 50 tonner, but what's the big deal? Its arms and legs are more bulky than a Scat and it has a long nose. I really don't think we have an issue here.

Certainly there are other things to worry about than a mech that is scaled on the small side...

[Ghogiel]

Tennex, on 07 October 2015 - 07:46 AM, said:

Have you been able to get past the problem other people have had when attempting to get accurate mech volume?

Yes, like 3 years ago. .

[zagibu]

Ghogiel, on 07 October 2015 - 08:16 AM, said:

Yes, like 3 years ago. .

Worthless without a source.

[Ghogiel]

zagibu, on 07 October 2015 - 08:20 AM, said:

Worthless without a source.

I have posted all this on the forums 3 years ago.

[RoboPatton]

Comparing crab to the Cic is a mistake imo, because the cicada is too big, just like the Centurian, Dragon and a few other badly sized mechs.

Crab also has has magnetic ST's, unlike the Cicada.

Also-- using a height comparison is deceptive considering the billboard-sized length of the crab.

Edited by RoboPatton, 07 October 2015 - 08:28 AM.