76 replies to this topic

[TELEFORCE]

The November Road Map mentions that the next PTS will add a feature having to do with sensor detection depending on how big the target is. Perhaps this will help light 'mechs a bit more if this feature goes live with the rest of the rebalance.

[DivineEvil]

DarthHias, on 01 November 2015 - 11:27 PM, said:

The Mech in my stable that has cost me the most C-Bills is my Locust 1E. After Engine Upgrades and Modules it sits way above 30 million C-Bills.

The total price of a stock Locust 1E, upgraded to the maximum, outfitted with best XL, double heatsinks and weapons, is below 7 million C-Bills. Stop playing a douche.

[jss78]

IMO the core problem is that there's just no useful role for the lights, as MWO is implemented. There's really no need for scouting, with maps this small (and even when they're large, gameplay and enemy movement tends to be predictable).

Although not by design, it's effectively an arena shooter, and for that, what you need is a robust damage-dealer. And there's just no reasonable way to have a light compete as a damage dealer -- not unless they're extraordinarily broken like the ACH, or unless we go for contrived solutions like totally crazy quirks for lights.

I'm still enjoying and getting decent earnings with my WLF's and PNT's, but I basically play them as within-group "light mediums". But, I honestly have no idea why I'd play a Locust, or a Stinger/Wasp if we ever get those, while they should lore-wise be the most common mechs of all. Not unless I explicitly wanted a hard mode -- nothing wrong with that, but it's tough enough for me as is.

[DarthHias]

DivineEvil, on 02 November 2015 - 01:43 AM, said:

The total price of a stock Locust 1E, upgraded to the maximum, outfitted with best XL, double heatsinks and weapons, is below 7 million C-Bills. Stop playing a douche.

I said with modules.
24 Millions worth of Seismic, Radar Derp, two weapon modules and Shock Absorb or Hill Climb. And yes a Light needs those way more than any other weight class. All in all 31 Millions as I said.
And you stop insulting me because you couldn´t be bothered to read my post right.

[L A V A]

Darian DelFord, on 01 November 2015 - 07:14 PM, said:

The disparity between lights and the heavies needs to be closed significantly in regards to C-bill acquisition. I have to work for every C-bill in a light to where in a heavy I can earn them practically sleeping.

The same can be said for EXP.

The basic problem is that MWO is fundamentally a "damage" based game where ALL MECHS ARE CONSIDERED EQUAL in the formulation of C-Bill and EXP acquisition. That is, no matter what type of mech you are in, you receive the same amount of C-Bills and EXP for a kill, for example. Given that MWO is a "damage" based game, that is logical.

However, there are important things in this "damage" based game which are not logical.

Look at the skill tiers, for example. ALL MECHS require the same amount of XP to level up to Master. No matter what mech you are in, you still have to earn 750 XP to unlock Cool Run. That is not logical under a "damage" based system because larger mechs carry more firepower and armor. If I am completely new at the game and I only fire one alpha (and hit) in my 8 SPL Firestarter I will get 32 points of damage. If I am in a 7 MPL Thunderbolt, I will get 42 points of damage. In the end, by merely firing and hitting with one alpha per game, I will level my Thunderbolt before I level my Firestarter.

So any new person starting to play MWO will immediately gravitate to those mechs which reap the most rewards and right now, that is heavy mechs.

Overall, what we have is a game based on linear thinking. That would work fine if all mechs were equal, but as we know they are not because the mech classes are SCALED in weight.

PGI needs to start introducing more scaling in the way they handle the game. When we look at the skill tiers that would suggest that a light should require less XP to level their mech than a heavy, for example. 300 damage done by a light should reap more C Bills and XP than 300 damage done in heavy, as another example.

It is only through scaling gameplay can we hope to incentivize playing ALL types of mechs in the game. This is especially true for new players.

All the rest of the stuff (roles, bonuses), are just bandaids. Level the playing field and folks will start playing different weight classes and MWO will become a hell'va lot more fun to play.

Edited by xLAVAx, 02 November 2015 - 06:37 AM.

[nehebkau]

I have long maintained that there needs to be score, skill and reward balancing based on mech weight. I'ts pretty easy to rack up the damage in a 70 alpha mech not so much in a 10 alpha mech.

[DivineEvil]

DarthHias, on 02 November 2015 - 02:28 AM, said:

I said with modules.
24 Millions worth of Seismic, Radar Derp, two weapon modules and Shock Absorb or Hill Climb. And yes a Light needs those way more than any other weight class. All in all 31 Millions as I said.
And you stop insulting me because you couldn´t be bothered to read my post right.

I'm sorry, but how exactly your preferrence to outfit a 20t mech, rather than any heavier mech changes the fact, that a mech itself is cheaper? I can as well put these 24 millions of modules and more on an assault.

[Bobzilla]

If they implement the info war changes and let lights collect the damage done because of their spotting (for score purposes only). Then they could have dmg scores for spotting. So LRMs would award the same damage to the light spotting on the end screen, and they'd get the partial from lasers.

[Darian DelFord]

I love how folks come into to these threads and their response is L2P. Gotta love it. There is a huge discrepancy in pay between lights and heavies. The main reason is the game is still heavily weighted towards damage.I do not have the 50+ Alpha that the heavy mechs have. I do not have the 15 tons of armor that the heavier mechs have. Even the new rebalance does nothing to help. hell I took an almost 50k cut in pay on the PTS.

There have been so many direct and in direct nerf's to lights its why play them any more. Only the insane do.

Edited by Darian DelFord, 02 November 2015 - 04:58 PM.

[Piousflea]

Agreed entirely. With the exception of the Arctic Cheater, Lights have great difficulty topping the damage charts. So it's really hard to earn money in a Light.

IMO they really need to put in bigger C-bill rewards for scouting, ECM coverage, AMS coverage, and Light-vs-Light defense.

[InspectorG]

Darian DelFord, on 01 November 2015 - 07:14 PM, said:

This seriously needs to be addressed. The difference between the gain is night and day. Yet another reason the light queue is below 10%

Heavies/Assaults are TOO AGILE. Nerf their Turn Rates/Twist Rates/ Arm Reach. Make MOST(the more powerfull ones) very forward oriented in firepower where more agile-weaker mechs (Summoner/Quickdraw) get better agility.

This way Flanking the heavy hitters is a viable tactic as range closes.

[Xetelian]

Stefka Kerensky, on 01 November 2015 - 11:18 PM, said:

lolled hard reading this

Keep rolling bra...

I lolled hard too

Plan to keep rolling bras off the ladies

Besides trolling, is there a reason you think the light queue is fine?

Edited by Xetelian, 02 November 2015 - 05:30 PM.

[Darian DelFord]

InspectorG, on 02 November 2015 - 05:18 PM, said:

Heavies/Assaults are TOO AGILE. Nerf their Turn Rates/Twist Rates/ Arm Reach. Make MOST(the more powerfull ones) very forward oriented in firepower where more agile-weaker mechs (Summoner/Quickdraw) get better agility.

This way Flanking the heavy hitters is a viable tactic as range closes.

Aye this is one of the in direct nerf's I am talking about. Skill = Skill. a light will get one shot at an assault before that assault has him in his cross hairs due to toro agility and backing up.

[InspectorG]

Darian DelFord, on 02 November 2015 - 05:28 PM, said:

Aye this is one of the in direct nerf's I am talking about. Skill = Skill. a light will get one shot at an assault before that assault has him in his cross hairs due to toro agility and backing up.

Caveat: MWO=/=BT

But as a reference point, 1 turn in BT was 10 seconds and many Assaults needed most of their movement just to about-face.

7-10 seconds to turn around in response to threat. Think about the skill demand with that for piloting heavies/assaults?

Would likey boost Mediums/lights, and mediums may be the go-to for newbs...kinda like hw they were the 'workhorse' of most armies.

[Druarc]

The other way to play lights is to pack hunt, 3-4 lights can rip through any mech pretty quickly, and if the pilot is inexperienced they often forget to focus fire meaning the lights take little damage.

Have been in several matchs where a lance of lights have accounted for more than 6 of the opponents.

[Alistair Winter]

Obviously, light mechs aren't able to generate as many c-bills as heavier mechs. Their match score is consistently lower than other mechs. They rarely get top score in damage or match score. Sometimes they get the most kills because they're able to pick off wounded targets, but you don't really earn a lot of c-bills from kills alone. 5 kills and 300 dmg doesn't really pay a lot more than 2 kills and 300 dmg.

There are three schools of thoughts on light mechs:
One is that they should earn more money from scouting and spotting, because their role is to be scouts and harassers. This is totally in conflict with both Battletech lore (where light mechs have various different roles) and the general principle of MWO (where it's up to the player to choose his or her playstyle)
Another is that they should get a flat bonus or some arbitrary special reward for being light mechs, just to compensate for the fact that MWO heavily favours heavy mechs in most ways. This is a heavy-handed and brutish solution, which doesn't help the fact that light mechs generally don't contribute as much as other mechs. Without solid role warfare mechanics, their role isn't really that important. You can field 6 Timber Wolves and 6 Storm Crows and do quite alright. It also doesn't help the fact that many light mech players feel like they're playing second fiddle to the real stars of the show, the heavy mechs.
A third school of thought is that light mech earnings are fine and people who whine just need to get good. The counter argument to this is simply that if you're able to net 150-200k per match in a light mech, you don't represent the normal player and you probably make more than that if you drop in heavy mechs. It takes a really good player to consistently bag 500-800 damage in a light mech, in every match. But being able to get those scores in a Laser Wolf isn't really that special. When people say "I make 200k every match in my Jenner" it's basically the same as when someone says "I do 800 dmg every match in my Panther". It may be true, but you can't really generalize that to the player population as a whole.

Some light mechs are mostly damage dealers and brawlers (Jenner, Firestarter)
Some light mechs are mostly scouts and cappers (LCT-1V)
Some light mechs are mostly fire support (Panther, Adder)
Some light mechs are mostly infotech force multipliers (RVN-3L or Kit Fox with ECM, NARC, TAG, BAP, UAV, etc)
There is no simple fix that makes them all more effective and increases their match score with the stroke of a pen.

I don't think PGI will ever get light mechs right in this game. People hated R&R, but R&R was actually a solution to increasing C-bill earnings for light mech pilots. A light mech player consistently doing 400 dmg per match would earn so much more than most heavy / assault mech players doing the same. Yeah, light mechs are expensive with XL300 engines, but they're usually around 11-12 million C-bills where assault mechs can run up to 20 million C-bills if they have big XL engines or Clantech.

[Fang01]

Darian DelFord, on 02 November 2015 - 04:54 PM, said:

I love how folks come into to these threads and their response is L2P. Gotta love it. There is a huge discrepancy in pay between lights and heavies. The main reason is the game is still heavily weighted towards damage.I do not have the 50+ Alpha that the heavy mechs have. I do not have the 15 tons of armor that the heavier mechs have. Even the new rebalance does nothing to help. hell I took an almost 50k cut in pay on the PTS.

There have been so many direct and in direct nerf's to lights its why play them any more. Only the insane do.

I spent most of the weekend event in my wolfhounds, bringing my Wlf-2R to over 70 drops @ an average of about 400 dmg per match. Took my 5V once...400.

Change lights to make them more accessible and the 5-8% of us who are good in them are gonna run wild like hulkamania

[Airu]

Making more rewards will not make more people play lights, lots of people are sitting on millions of cbills anyway.
The problem is nerfed JJs and increased mobility of heavies and assaults (especially clans) that takes away lights main and only strength - agility. No amount of structure or info quirks will save you from 1 good alpha.
I would buff all or most underused light's acceleration and deceleration and maybe turn radius, so that they can atleast stay behind that assaults back.
Once the mechanic works in rock paper scissors fashion, maybe more people will play lights.

[stealthraccoon]

DarthHias, on 02 November 2015 - 02:28 AM, said:

I said with modules.
24 Millions worth of Seismic, Radar Derp, two weapon modules and Shock Absorb or Hill Climb. And yes a Light needs those way more than any other weight class. All in all 31 Millions as I said.
And you stop insulting me because you couldn´t be bothered to read my post right.

This is why I don't buy modules, the return on investment just doesn't balance out. I find that running single heat sinks can help me hone my skills more that spending my hard earned MC on extras (I also can never remember what key I set for artillery so I just mash until a UAV pops up or thinks exploded).

I'm almost strictly a light pilot, it's a different game when you are one alpha away from the scrap heap. Lights = hard mode.

Edited by stealthraccoon, 02 November 2015 - 08:42 PM.

[BearFlag]

I have five Locusts that I rarely drive any more. It doesn't take an alpha to kill or maim a Locust. Four clan ERML at range will do it. The straw that broke the camel's back for me was Forest Colony. Apparently, PGI thinks players LIKE maps with fog, domino trees, snags and mist.

From the perspective of a Locust FC is mist and foliage. The map's useless low lying, ornamental vegetation is everywhere and everywhere taller than a Locust. It's like an ant running through a lawn. It's nothing to the dog, but the ant sees nothing but green. With all that crap, you can't tell if you're about to run into a wall or off a cliff. But, of course, the enemy can see YOU without seeing you. Shoot the red box.

Everyone knows what lights are supposed to do and tell you in game:
- escort the heavies
- scout
- get locks
- cap
- round and kill their LRM's
- engage the enemy lights
- harass
- provide ECM cover (if you have it)
- etc, etc and conflicting etc

Doesn't matter what you do, someone isn't going to like it. If you're a light ECM sniper, forget it - you're scum.

Edited by BearFlag, 03 November 2015 - 12:01 AM.