257 replies to this topic

[Red Legs Greaves]

I've played a lot of CW and I think it is funny that this imbalance issue keeps being brought up by IS players. I think a fun experiment would be to have the Clan invasion corridors removed and to have the clans fight against themselves in the homeworlds. The IS can fight each other and find something new to complain about, I have a feeling much wouldn't change. The coordinated teams are still going to crush the uncoordinated ones. Maybe after a few months of that we'll see a thread about how 12 mans shouldn't be allowed to drop in CW anymore.

[Volkodav]

MischiefSC, on 25 October 2015 - 04:08 PM, said:

10 v 12 was never viable. Even pgi said so out of the gate.

Locked engines (and structure) is what balances the lower weight and crit slots on Clan gear. If it was normalized for size/weight then I'm all for unlocking Clan mechs. IIC mechs are already like that to a degree and potentially outmoded all existing Clan mechs.

Assuming it normalizes another way then I'd be all for something like swapping an xl for an equal tonnage STD engine. The point being that tonnage lockup is what offsets 1/2 weight es,ff, missiles, etc. Same sort of issue with locked slots but smaller equipment.

Currently though the xl speed/tonnage saving but std durability is pretty broken.

Kin3ticX, on 27 October 2015 - 01:52 AM, said:

As for Russ's tweet on Clan XLs, a change like that would not be simple as it also brings into question the various omnimech hardlocks like the engine size. It would have to be a series of changes. I suspect they are concerned how to balance not only omnimechs but also non-omnis (including ones we dont know about). Its tricky and is probably the reason for the whole PTS grand rebalance thing they have been working on since ~June. Quirks were the politically easy route but also a dead end so now they are thinking about pre-quirkening balance again.

If this is true, then we must look to the future:

PGI plz:
Just give IS - Fusion Engine - Light

And make "time jump" to new weapons for all, new mechs and other/

will be good for all! i vote this

Edited by Volkodav, 27 October 2015 - 07:20 AM.

[Volkodav]

Task - to balance.

Nerf CL engine - less TTK
Buff IS engine - more TTK

I agree Fusion Engine - Light even without a "time jump." . Although it would be even better - new mech, new weapons, new equipment and other - more opportunities for everyone. In any case, rollepley in its present form is not in the game. Clans have captured three Tukayyid), Inner Sphere News was not long ago, CW just one of the game modes, etc.

Edited by Volkodav, 27 October 2015 - 07:21 AM.

[DivineEvil]

Ed Steele, on 26 October 2015 - 11:42 PM, said:

Actually Clan mechs are already nerfed to the point where they are not an unbeatable threat. I can not count how many times that I have easily taken out overheated clan mechs. Yeah, they might hit me a couple times before I can get into range, but then they are generally easier to take out than other IS mechs. In BATTLETECH, there have always been mechs that were better than others, better designs, newer, older (Lostech). It was always the pilots in BATTLETECH who overcame the odds, or died.

No in hell they're not. Overheated CW mechs are just as dead as IS overheated mechs. This is not a valid argument. In CW, cooperated Clan team always beats similarly cooperated IS team, because Clan mechs in general are outright better in almost every aspect. This was not the case prior to last Clan pack, since Ebon Jaguars and Arctic Cheetahs weren't there.

In BATTLETECH, it was not the pilots, that overcame the odds. It was the numbers. MWO is not automatically has to follow that awful idea. We're not supposed to make people to be cannon fodder just because of lore. IS and Clan mechs has to become equal, otherwise one part of content becomes redundant. Outside of public domain, in your private lobbies, please, arm IS mechs into stock loadouts and have all the lore masturbation you want.

What really gets me, is that I see everyone only bother with their own little problems: how to balance Clan XLs, or how to stick lore into every hole where it fits, or how to make IS vs Clan matches, or how to stitch this and that... and nobody really cares about how to make MWO a good game for broad auditory. Why?

- Please, stop referring to lore. This game is initially far from lore. We're thousands of mercenaries running mechs with all the tech, each owning over 50 personally outfitted mechs, paying no bills for repairs and rearming. In grand scheme of things, nobody cares.
- Please, stop referring to BATTLETECH. This is not BATTLETECH. It's a MMO Mechwarrior game. Wargame rules do not apply here, and some are already long gone.
- Please, stop referring to Clan Pack prices. Preorder is made to support developers, not to buy you an overpowered stick to poke everyone, forever. If you don't have money to spare or don't want to support PGI, then don't buy any of them. This is not something you can use as an argument for imbalance. More expensive packs only meant you get better mechs upfront without much need to upgrade or refit, and you could've sold any extra mechs leaving their Omni-pods. Stop being an idiot.

[Hades Trooper]

And people wonder why i'm not buying ANY packs from now on.

[Volkodav]

DivineEvil, on 27 October 2015 - 08:03 AM, said:

Spoiler

No in hell they're not. Overheated CW mechs are just as dead as IS overheated mechs. This is not a valid argument. In CW, cooperated Clan team always beats similarly cooperated IS team, because Clan mechs in general are outright better in almost every aspect. This was not the case prior to last Clan pack, since Ebon Jaguars and Arctic Cheetahs weren't there.

In BATTLETECH, it was not the pilots, that overcame the odds. It was the numbers. MWO is not automatically has to follow that awful idea. We're not supposed to make people to be cannon fodder just because of lore. IS and Clan mechs has to become equal, otherwise one part of content becomes redundant. Outside of public domain, in your private lobbies, please, arm IS mechs into stock loadouts and have all the lore masturbation you want.

What really gets me, is that I see everyone only bother with their own little problems: how to balance Clan XLs, or how to stick lore into every hole where it fits, or how to make IS vs Clan matches, or how to stitch this and that... and nobody really cares about how to make MWO a good game for broad auditory. Why?

- Please, stop referring to lore. This game is initially far from lore. We're thousands of mercenaries running mechs with all the tech, each owning over 50 personally outfitted mechs, paying no bills for repairs and rearming. In grand scheme of things, nobody cares.
- Please, stop referring to BATTLETECH. This is not BATTLETECH. It's a MMO Mechwarrior game. Wargame rules do not apply here, and some are already long gone.
- Please, stop referring to Clan Pack prices. Preorder is made to support developers, not to buy you an overpowered stick to poke everyone, forever. If you don't have money to spare or don't want to support PGI, then don't buy any of them. This is not something you can use as an argument for imbalance. More expensive packs only meant you get better mechs upfront without much need to upgrade or refit, and you could've sold any extra mechs leaving their Omni-pods. Stop being an idiot.

Emotionally

Edited by Volkodav, 27 October 2015 - 09:59 AM.

[Black Ivan]

Sigh, interesting to see IS complain again and again, although IS Mechs can bring better pin point damage to the battle.

PGI should remove Clan vs IS for sometime, so that IS can find something new to complain about.

[Lugh]

Odanan, on 25 October 2015 - 03:24 PM, said:

In IS, you need to weight (no pun intended) the advantages and risks of fielding a XL Engine. With the Clan XL, taking the Std. Engine is just foolish.

OH M GEE You do realize it's impossible to take a STD engine in a clan omnimech right?

There is just so much ignorance IS side it's no wonder you guys have so many problems...

Edited by Lugh, 27 October 2015 - 10:40 AM.

[DivineEvil]

Black Ivan, on 27 October 2015 - 10:16 AM, said:

Sigh, interesting to see IS complain again and again, although IS Mechs can bring better pin point damage to the battle.

Hmmm, yeah. How exactly?

Quote

PGI should remove Clan vs IS for sometime, so that IS can find something new to complain about.

Maybe they shouldn't have brought Clans to begin with. There were plently of IS mechs and weapons to work with for a looong time.

[Sjorpha]

CoffiNail, on 25 October 2015 - 11:09 AM, said:

Soon Clans and IS will be balanced to perfection and there will be no difference to the factions aside from the logo you have assigned.

Why do clan mechs have to be more powerful in order to be different?

If that is the only way to be different you can think about you need to exercise you imagination, there are a thousand other ways for things to be different.

Some examples are already in the game, IS and Clan LRMs are different in how they function but arguably equal in power. Same with autocannons. Lasers are a bit samey, which is boring, it would be nice if clan lasers functioned differently from IS lasers.

All you have to do is design things to function in different ways and then you can balance them in power without losing that difference. The current problem is that some IS and Clan tech are too similar in how they work, like gauss for example, and that leaves only the superiority of the clan gauss to differentiate them. If you instead made clan gauss work differently from IS gauss, like no charge but very long cooldown or something, then it would be easier to make them equally powerful without losing the flavor.

[Lugh]

Elizander, on 27 October 2015 - 12:40 AM, said:

The basic question is:

"Should we bring IS up to Clan levels, bring Clan down to IS levels, or find a median in between for both?"

IS Standard Engines are a penalty in itself. Lower speed, lower twist rate, less weapons. If you want to see what a Direwolf looks like minus 9.5 tons of pod space you might not enjoy the results.

I'd rather go halfway. First we'll balance IS/Clan XL by making them both not kill the mech on one ST loss. (IS engine bigger, sturdier so yeah it takes 4 crits to blow up instead of 3). Each crit to the engine removes 3 Heat Sinks and reduces Engine Rating by 10%. This makes an IS XL Mech have -9 Engine DHS and -30% Engine Rating (300 XL will perform like a 210XL) and this makes Clan XL mechs have -6 Engine DHS and -20% Engine Rating (300 XL will perform like 240XL).

So an IS mech will keep moving when the ST is lost with an XL engine on but will be slower and run hotter than a clan mech that loses its ST. This will also heavily penalize Laservomit because you're not gonna do much wub when you lose your 6-9 engine DHS.

TL;DR

• IS/Clan mechs with XL don't die from one ST loss.
  
• When ST is lost on an XL mech, IS lose 9 DHS and 30% engine rating while Clans lose 6 DHS and 20% engine rating.

Why such arbitrary and nonsensical numbers? There are only three slots in an IS side torso and 2 in a clan ST for XL engines. Even using the magic of engine heat sinks getting to be one slot each, that works out to be 3 DHS for IS and 2 DHS for Clans...

The percentages you quote seem also arbitrary as each has IS(12 crit slots) and Clan (10 Crit slots) so that should be 25% lost of rating for IS and 20% loss of rating for Clan.

At least do the math around the systems in place already please.

[Domenoth]

Lugh, on 27 October 2015 - 10:39 AM, said:

OH M GEE You do realize it's impossible to take a STD engine in a clan omnimech right?

There is just so much ignorance IS side it's no wonder you guys have so many problems...

OH M GEE, You do realize the new Origins Pack has 5 Clan Mechs that start with STD Engines, right?

There is just so much ignorance Clan side it's no wonder you guys have so many problems...

Ever try to actually understand what someone writes instead of just disagreeing with it on a knee-jerk reaction?

[Reno Blade]

I always felt the risk/reward for IS XL engines was too binary by losing a side torso (3x crit in BT and instant kill in MWO).

I'd go for longer time to live with bigger side effects such as 25% heat (25% reduced heat cap and heat dissipation) and speed reduction for each side torso destroyed for IS and Clan XL engines and removing the death by one/two destroyed sides completely.

This means that a Timberwolf with 90kph can now run 45kph as a zombie (lost both side torsos) or 67.5kph with one side torso destroyed.

Ofcourse the speed reduction also needs to reduce agility (torso twist and chassis turn rate) by the same amount, or equivalent of engine which would provide the reduced speed.

And then to top the balance, introduce BT heat scale effects (such as slower movement and aiming for high heat).
This would bring high heat machines to very slow movement and reduce the usefullness of hot builds by a very big amount.

[NocturnalBeast]

BazzOOka, on 26 October 2015 - 11:56 PM, said:

Hello. I'm a Mechwarrior fan from way back; I played the original board game and all the PC versions that came out. It was without doubt my favorite game. Having now played MWO i am both pleased and displeased with some aspects of the game, but I accept not everyone can be pleased all of the time.
The mismatch between Clan and IS mechs is imperative so as to maintain the historical significance of the original game. War in every sence of the word is not balanced, however the "underdog" usually finds a way to overcome the odds. But this was not overcome by telling the more advanced enemy to remove some weapons or reduce their engine speed. That's ludicrous, as is the idea to nerf Clan mechs in any way.

Clan mechs are now the benchmark and the challenge should be making the IS mechs more competitive instead of the other way round.

Think of what happens on the battlefield as it is played now... The winning team gets salvage. One idea would be to give pilots of IS mechs the ability to train for the "Operate Clan Weapons" skill which would then allow them to install and operate Clan weapons that where salvaged from the battlefield after having won a battle that contained Clan Mechs.

Also IS mechs can be given an extra module and their own sub-set of modules, for instance, 50% faster target lock and identification of Clan mechs, 25% longer scanner range against Clan mechs, ect ect. Use your immagination.

I think what is important here is to NOT ruin the gaming experience for one group to satisfy the other. Nerfing has never been good for gaming morale.

We all need to accept the most important part of any game is the game play and by over balancing you will just negate the need to have anything other than 1 light, 1 medium, 1 heavy and 1 assault mech to choose from. The game needs this mismatch but I think is could be overcome by giving the IS pilots more specific "anti-clan" skills" and give them the opportunity to use Clan equipment salvaged from the battlefield....

TERF THE NERF I say.

Thanks for your time.

[REDACTED]

I like this idea of IS - only modules as a balancing idea. Modules could be used to simulate an IS pilot's skill overcoming the limitations of their older / less effective hardware. Wasn't this sort of the original intent for modules to begin with? More in-depth and customizable pilot skill trees would help as well. This is what PGI should tweak, not the mechs themselves!

Edited by Ed Steele, 27 October 2015 - 11:29 AM.

[SkippyT72]

Ed Steele, on 27 October 2015 - 11:26 AM, said:

I like this idea of IS - only modules as a balancing idea. Modules could be used to simulate an IS pilot's skill overcoming the limitations of their older / less effective hardware. Wasn't this sort of the original intent for modules to begin with? More in-depth and customizable pilot skill trees would help as well. This is what PGI should tweak, not the mechs themselves!

I'd agree so long as they don't go overboard like they have with some of the chassis quirks making the mechs of certain chassis too strong till they are the only ones you see in game.

[SkippyT72]

DivineEvil, on 27 October 2015 - 08:03 AM, said:

No in hell they're not. Overheated CW mechs are just as dead as IS overheated mechs. This is not a valid argument. In CW, cooperated Clan team always beats similarly cooperated IS team, because Clan mechs in general are outright better in almost every aspect. This was not the case prior to last Clan pack, since Ebon Jaguars and Arctic Cheetahs weren't there.

In BATTLETECH, it was not the pilots, that overcame the odds. It was the numbers. MWO is not automatically has to follow that awful idea. We're not supposed to make people to be cannon fodder just because of lore. IS and Clan mechs has to become equal, otherwise one part of content becomes redundant. Outside of public domain, in your private lobbies, please, arm IS mechs into stock loadouts and have all the lore masturbation you want.

What really gets me, is that I see everyone only bother with their own little problems: how to balance Clan XLs, or how to stick lore into every hole where it fits, or how to make IS vs Clan matches, or how to stitch this and that... and nobody really cares about how to make MWO a good game for broad auditory. Why?

- Please, stop referring to lore. This game is initially far from lore. We're thousands of mercenaries running mechs with all the tech, each owning over 50 personally outfitted mechs, paying no bills for repairs and rearming. In grand scheme of things, nobody cares.
- Please, stop referring to BATTLETECH. This is not BATTLETECH. It's a MMO Mechwarrior game. Wargame rules do not apply here, and some are already long gone.
- Please, stop referring to Clan Pack prices. Preorder is made to support developers, not to buy you an overpowered stick to poke everyone, forever. If you don't have money to spare or don't want to support PGI, then don't buy any of them. This is not something you can use as an argument for imbalance. More expensive packs only meant you get better mechs upfront without much need to upgrade or refit, and you could've sold any extra mechs leaving their Omni-pods. Stop being an idiot.

Adding more layers of crap to attempt to make all the mechs and weapons the same only confuses new players and makes the game even more unbalanced, or do you think the new players when and if they show up will understand all the layers of maxing a mech out of which mechs are actually viable due to all the stupid quirks some mech chassis get and others don't?

I'm all for a better game, but attempting to make everything "fair" they are attempting to balance skill and teamwork which is not possible in a multiplayer game.

Edited by SkippyT72, 27 October 2015 - 01:45 PM.

[MischiefSC]

kka, on 26 October 2015 - 09:33 PM, said:

If 10 vs 12 balances the ACTUAL GAMEPLAY I think balancing the rewards is easy.

Matchmaking will not be a issue. Just put 10 vs 10 clan, 12 vs 12 IS and 10 vs 12 clan vs IS in.

PGI please, can you at least TEST the 10 vs 12 in PST?

So if Clans were inherently inferior to is, would you play them? Don't answer - I'll be honest, I likely wouldn't trust the response. You're not going to get people to play the guy who dies more often and is in inferior gear all the time but wins by burying the other team under his dead body. We can't even get a Elon system to work because everyone cares more about kdr than win/loss and you want a system designed for one side to die more often?

Tell you what. Run weekend private matches where one side runs stock is mechs and the other tricked out Clanmechs. Get thousands of people to show up on both sides and play that way exclusively. Then you can say you have support for the idea that this would not a terrible idea.

You're not going to fill matches and grow the game based on paying people extra to be fodder for other players.

Edited by MischiefSC, 27 October 2015 - 01:52 PM.

[Peiper]

Battle value is one way to balance things. If mechs and technology aren't equal, that's okay, as long as they have a value commensurate to their abilities on the field. This will work for public drops.

For CW drops, simply give the clans 10 pilots for every 12 on the IS side.

But nerfing clan tech or buffing inner sphere tech to bridge the gap is not right. And people who PAY extra money for clan tech shouldn't later have what they paid for stripped from them. Yes, I paid for clan mechs because I knew they were better. Yes, the Warhammer and Marauder are overpriced, but I tell myself that's going to pay for the lawyers to defend their use in a possible court case.

If clan mechs are nerfed too much, I want a refund equivalent to how much they've been nerfed. That is fair to me as a consumer. Since I don't actually expect them to do this, I DO expect that they do their best to do right by both the customers and players and balance out the matchmaker and community warfare via the tools of battle value and 10 Clan vs. 12 IS mechs. That is BOTH FAIR and RIGHT.

Clan tech should be more powerful than IS tech, BUT IS should have more mechs on the field to face them.

[Pihoqahiak]

Domenoth, on 27 October 2015 - 11:02 AM, said:

OH M GEE, You do realize the new Origins Pack has 5 Clan Mechs that start with STD Engines, right?

There is just so much ignorance Clan side it's no wonder you guys have so many problems...

Ever try to actually understand what someone writes instead of just disagreeing with it on a knee-jerk reaction?

Only 2 of the 4 (not 5 as you wrote) mechs in the Origins Pack have Standard engines, not 5. PGI hasn't said how Clan Battlemech construction rules will work exactly in MW:O yet, so we'll see what will happen with them.

[MischiefSC]

So I bought the Thudder during the overquirk period for wrppcs. I don't get a refund because they got balanced.

Clans were stated to be planned for equal balance from day one. Saying you wanted p2w and are upset that PGI eventually did what they promised and balanced them is pretty silly.

This isn't new. This is just long overdue. No way should any refunds go out. The 3D I bought during the Poptart meta is nerfed by comparison. The Atlas from the first days of open beta isn't insanely op now that ac20s and srms are not way op.

That argument is so baseless it's embarrassing how often it came up.

If anyone bought Clan mechs because they wanted to p2w but op stuff they have no basis for complaint. That was always against product description.

So I bought the Thudder during the overquirk period for wrppcs. I don't get a refund because they got balanced.

Clans were stated to be planned for equal balance from day one. Saying you wanted p2w and are upset that PGI eventually did what they promised and balanced them is pretty silly.

This isn't new. This is just long overdue. No way should any refunds go out. The 3D I bought during the Poptart meta is nerfed by comparison. The Atlas from the first days of open beta isn't insanely op now that ac20s and srms are not way op.

That argument is so baseless it's embarrassing how often it came up.

If anyone bought Clan mechs because they wanted to p2w but op stuff they have no basis for complaint. That was always against product description.

So I bought the Thudder during the overquirk period for wrppcs. I don't get a refund because they got balanced.

Clans were stated to be planned for equal balance from day one. Saying you wanted p2w and are upset that PGI eventually did what they promised and balanced them is pretty silly.

This isn't new. This is just long overdue. No way should any refunds go out. The 3D I bought during the Poptart meta is nerfed by comparison. The Atlas from the first days of open beta isn't insanely op now that ac20s and srms are not way op.

That argument is so baseless it's embarrassing how often it came up.

If anyone bought Clan mechs because they wanted to p2w but op stuff they have no basis for complaint. That was always against product description.