344 replies to this topic

[Anixantheas]

Langstes, on 25 November 2012 - 08:21 AM, said:

Dude, you are so lame to complain. Even the IS costomized there mechs. The variants are the base line mechs. This does not mean that you can not change your loadout. Look what Justin Allard did with Yen-Lo-Wang.

Why don't you look up Yen-Lo-Wang, yes it was customized. The bill to customize that bad boy was footed by head of the Federated Suns. This was during a great big "scam" that exiled Justin and then let things fall so that Maximillian gets hosed.
Yes customization existed. It was time comsuming, Expensive as all hell, and hard to do thanks to the availability of actual parts at the time.

You want to bring in fluff reasons for being able to customize, bring in all the fluff, not just the stuff you want.

[SpiralRazor]

Anixantheas, on 25 November 2012 - 08:30 AM, said:

Why don't you look up Yen-Lo-Wang, yes it was customized. The bill to customize that bad boy was footed by head of the Federated Suns. This was during a great big "scam" that exiled Justin and then let things fall so that Maximillian gets hosed.
Yes customization existed. It was time comsuming, Expensive as all hell, and hard to do thanks to the availability of actual parts at the time.

You want to bring in fluff reasons for being able to customize, bring in all the fluff, not just the stuff you want.

Okay, lets bring in all the fluff bro. For houses and companies with the resources, customization was a breeze! Time consuming yes, but that was dependent on how many people you had working on it. The reason why there werent more super custom mechs was simply because it wasnt worth it, when the customized IS mechs just traded off- none were strictly better then there unmodified equivalents, just mounted different gear or weapons to suit the primary driver...

The Clan Omni Pod system really threw the IS for a loop though...Instead of having to spend days to change loadouts, the Clans were able to do it within hours and at no hard cost.


Lets also be crystal clear that weapons are the easiest things to change, then FF and heat sinks, whereas as fitting a new engine or endo steel was a massive undertaking..

[Landomatic]

Wolv e, on 09 July 2012 - 03:28 PM, said:

Aye, hard point are fine, but still does not prevent "unreasonable" mech configs..

The balance is in the gear, yes you could put a PPC on a Jenner; but there are drawbacks to offset the one big money shot the Jenner pilot trades for that. One shot every 4 seconds, and it's actually a DPS loss as the 4 tons of equivalent Medium lasers would be unavailable. Not too mention, in TT rules you could customize your IS mechs as well. Not sure why you're angry about this. Dare I suggest you're having issues with your own config or perhaps not grouping with friends? Citing your example, a small Lance would likely molest a Jenner in a short order as they lose their ability to strafe on and off the target as they move becuase there usual two strats (given common warfare roles) are:
1.) while running circles around their target, streaming semi-accurate laser fire or streak SRM there targets to fire and forget while focusing on driving
2.) scout, Tag, and paint targets for LRM boats

So, what gives?

[Khobai]

Quote

streaks actually are bad efficiency wise...

no they arnt. because of the shotty netcode theyre pretty much the only reliable weapon right now.

[Landomatic]

Fiachdubh, on 25 November 2012 - 08:17 AM, said:

Agree totally, the TT rules on customization are ridiculous and at odds with the fiction. It is meant to be very difficult and expensive to make changes which made the Clan omni system such a big deal. Seriously the rules allowed any weapon in the legs if enough crits free there. Would prefare to see much more limited customization, make it a big deal when you can do it and end the plague of Streak Cats.

Do you think when "We" sat down and table top played a Solaris 7 scenario, or even an IS style campaign that keeping the game "canon" to the lore of the universe made us less likely to pull out the Technical Readouts and stopped us from enjoying in the fun of customization? Customization was the total fun of BattleTech. If this has de-evolved into another Streak-Cat post, just move past 270m, or put a PPC on your Jenner.

[Melcyna]

Khobai, on 25 November 2012 - 11:28 AM, said:

no they arnt. because of the shotty netcode theyre pretty much the only reliable weapon right now.

read the rest of the lines...

yes, due to MWO poor interpolation (which is part of the netcode) it is one of the only few weapons capable of bypassing the poor latency compensation built into the interpolation.

strictly speaking however, if we just look at it's weight and heat generated per tonnage and damage inflicted, it's actually quite poor and inefficient especially since most mech in general carry AMS.

[zverofaust]

Agree 100%. Despite what all the nay-sayers have to moan about it, over-customization has ruinous effects on Mechwarrior multiplayer gameplay, and this problem becomes worse under the F2P model when balancing needs to be done carefully.

From every point of view, overcustomization is bad for the game and leads to min-maxing bullcrap which is pretty much as close to Call of Duty you can get with this kind of game.

Not to mention how little sense it makes; swapping out MGs for Gauss Rifles or AC/20s is like a tank switching out its commander's turret machinegun for a 120mm cannon.

[Joseph Mallan]

Zvero...
...
Buddy. You are not swapping out two Machine guns for two Gauss. You are swapping out two MG, 2 PPC, 2 Medium Lasers, 3-4 Heat sinks, and some armor to install 2 Gauss. You took off a Metric sheet ton of Weapons to have two BFG. Don't underplay the changes made to put two large guns in big empty areas on a Mech.

Edited by Joseph Mallan, 25 November 2012 - 05:58 PM.

[Duvanor]

For those canon junkies among you:

What do you think did the IS Houses do between the 3040s and 3050s? Do you think they build legions of new mechs to employ Star League tech? If so, you are wrong. They customized and produced upgrade kits.

[Churzy]

Joseph Mallan, on 25 November 2012 - 05:57 PM, said:

Zvero...
...
Buddy. You are not swapping out two Machine guns for two Gauss. You are swapping out two MG, 2 PPC, 2 Medium Lasers, 3-4 Heat sinks, and some armor to install 2 Gauss. You took off a Metric sheet ton of Weapons to have two BFG. Don't underplay the changes made to put two large guns in big empty areas on a Mech.

Well, this could make sense IF the Gauss were placed in the "ears" which are the ones with room for a massive cannon. I know the "rules" allow it, but it doesn't change the fact that you're fitting 30 tons of equipment in a spot meant to hold a little over a ton. The chassis simply wouldn't be able to hold, and the whole customization process would be so costly that you'd end up with a completely different Mech. I would say it'd rank as a new Variant at the very least,

It's not as simple as replacing a LRM15 with a SRM6, or a AC5 with an AC10; you're replacing the smallest weapon with the heaviest one. Gausscats are probably the most "obscene" example of over-customization. Compared to the amount of work and money you'd need, the Yen-Lo-Wang is almost an amateur's piece

So yes, I agree with the OP, there has to be a sensible limit. Just sensible, not overly strict. Plus, by putting in certain limits, Mechs would be easier to balance against each other, and there would be a point in Variants with similar hardpoint layout.

[Joseph Mallan]

Churzy, on 25 November 2012 - 06:15 PM, said:

Well, this could make sense IF the Gauss were placed in the "ears" which are the ones with room for a massive cannon. I know the "rules" allow it, but it doesn't change the fact that you're fitting 30 tons of equipment in a spot meant to hold a little over a ton. The chassis simply wouldn't be able to hold, and the whole customization process would be so costly that you'd end up with a completely different Mech. I would say it'd rank as a new Variant at the very least,

It's not as simple as replacing a LRM15 with a SRM6, or a AC5 with an AC10; you're replacing the smallest weapon with the heaviest one. Gausscats are probably the most "obscene" example of over-customization. Compared to the amount of work and money you'd need, the Yen-Lo-Wang is almost an amateur's piece

So yes, I agree with the OP, there has to be a sensible limit. Just sensible, not overly strict. Plus, by putting in certain limits, Mechs would be easier to balance against each other, and there would be a point in Variants with similar hardpoint layout.

Ears LOL I love this. Look at the Thunder Hawk which has a Gauss in each side torso. Muck less room for a Gauss in that torso than in a Cat.

Customization is a bunch of handwavium. No real laws of physics were damaged during the playing of this game.

Edited by Joseph Mallan, 25 November 2012 - 06:49 PM.

[Imagine Dragons]

Joseph Mallan, on 25 November 2012 - 06:48 PM, said:

Ears LOL I love this. Look at the Thunder Hawk which has a Gauss in each side torso. Muck less room for a Gauss in that torso than in a Cat.

Customization is a bunch of handwavium. No real laws of physics were damaged during the playing of this game.

Well, for starters its a 100 ton assault mech, and sense of scale is kinda skewed...

[Antonio]

I think the current weapon customization system is fine but I think the engine, internal structure ,and special equipment should not be configurable. It would give more value to variants having a particular engine or endo-steel. Right now the only value between different variants is the hardpoints which do not differentiate them as much as I would like.

[Melcyna]

??? if the engine and internals are not configurable then how many variants they have to release to cope with all the possible permutations ppl will like?

Frankly ppl seems to have lost their sights on what the objective is....

we want a more structured customization, we do NOT WANT TO REDUCE customization itself because customization IS PART OF THE FUN OF THE GAME.

You don't fix imbalance problems on the mech by shooting the customization down... you fix it by introducing better rules that the customization follows.

note: case in point, i want my hunch to move faster... so under the idea that we can't replace the engine and internals then they need to release whole slew of variants for all the hunch with bigger engine? or i want to move slower but with better armor capacity so then they release a whole entire set of variants that is OTHERWISE IDENTICAL to the original save for the smaller engine?

that's ridiculous, we'd have so many duplicate variants with hardly any difference on them save for their engine... and that might not even be the right ratio the players want which is impossible to get right since we'd have to put forward ludicrous amount of variants to cope with all the possible permutations that players would like.

Edited by Melcyna, 25 November 2012 - 07:22 PM.

[Nutlink]

I like the customization as it is now, but I would LOVE it if they had fixed weapons or equipment for some mechs. Like 2 medium lasers in the CT of the Centurion, 2 machine guns on the torso of the K2s, BAP/ECM on the Raven 3Ls, that sort of thing. Make them a permanent part of the mech.

[Tuku]

Realisem in a game where 100tons bipedal robots are the penical of warfare...

[Melcyna]

Tuku, on 25 November 2012 - 07:29 PM, said:

Realisem in a game where 100tons bipedal robots are the penical of warfare...

While some probably argued in that manner, the others do have a point... in that being able to shove things into locations that didn't seems capable of handling them sometimes creates quite a few issues in terms of gameplay balance.

ie: it's not realism we care about, rather it's the gameplay effect...

gauss cat for example put the massive gauss rifle into a hard to hit side torso of catapult... so unlike other mech with projectile slots capable of mounting gauss rifle, the gauss cat has a much lower chance overall of losing the weapon... compared to say hunch, or dragon, or worse... centurion which nearly always lose it's projectile arm in MWO match...

in fact these days i consider it given that if i am bringing the centurion into the field and i engage in short range that i WILL lose the projectile arm, and i specifically mounted my weapons to ensure that i don't lose too much firepower if i intend to engage in short range.

[MWHawke]

Anixantheas, on 25 November 2012 - 08:30 AM, said:

Why don't you look up Yen-Lo-Wang, yes it was customized. The bill to customize that bad boy was footed by head of the Federated Suns. This was during a great big "scam" that exiled Justin and then let things fall so that Maximillian gets hosed.
Yes customization existed. It was time comsuming, Expensive as all hell, and hard to do thanks to the availability of actual parts at the time.

You want to bring in fluff reasons for being able to customize, bring in all the fluff, not just the stuff you want.

Lol! There are so many other examples other than Kai. Don't tell other people they are bringing fluff when you don't know your stuff.

[MWHawke]

zverofaust, on 25 November 2012 - 05:17 PM, said:

Agree 100%. Despite what all the nay-sayers have to moan about it, over-customization has ruinous effects on Mechwarrior multiplayer gameplay, and this problem becomes worse under the F2P model when balancing needs to be done carefully.

From every point of view, overcustomization is bad for the game and leads to min-maxing bullcrap which is pretty much as close to Call of Duty you can get with this kind of game.

Not to mention how little sense it makes; swapping out MGs for Gauss Rifles or AC/20s is like a tank switching out its commander's turret machinegun for a 120mm cannon.

Customization leads to players designing their mechs to suit their play style. How is that bad?

Churzy, on 25 November 2012 - 06:15 PM, said:

Well, this could make sense IF the Gauss were placed in the "ears" which are the ones with room for a massive cannon. I know the "rules" allow it, but it doesn't change the fact that you're fitting 30 tons of equipment in a spot meant to hold a little over a ton. The chassis simply wouldn't be able to hold, and the whole customization process would be so costly that you'd end up with a completely different Mech. I would say it'd rank as a new Variant at the very least,

It's not as simple as replacing a LRM15 with a SRM6, or a AC5 with an AC10; you're replacing the smallest weapon with the heaviest one. Gausscats are probably the most "obscene" example of over-customization. Compared to the amount of work and money you'd need, the Yen-Lo-Wang is almost an amateur's piece

So yes, I agree with the OP, there has to be a sensible limit. Just sensible, not overly strict. Plus, by putting in certain limits, Mechs would be easier to balance against each other, and there would be a point in Variants with similar hardpoint layout.

There is already another thread where this was handled. Please don't start it again and waste time.

[MWHawke]

Melcyna, on 25 November 2012 - 07:47 PM, said:

While some probably argued in that manner, the others do have a point... in that being able to shove things into locations that didn't seems capable of handling them sometimes creates quite a few issues in terms of gameplay balance.

ie: it's not realism we care about, rather it's the gameplay effect...

gauss cat for example put the massive gauss rifle into a hard to hit side torso of catapult... so unlike other mech with projectile slots capable of mounting gauss rifle, the gauss cat has a much lower chance overall of losing the weapon... compared to say hunch, or dragon, or worse... centurion which nearly always lose it's projectile arm in MWO match...

in fact these days i consider it given that if i am bringing the centurion into the field and i engage in short range that i WILL lose the projectile arm, and i specifically mounted my weapons to ensure that i don't lose too much firepower if i intend to engage in short range.

That is coz you dont aim for the arm whereas the other team does. So, how is that a chassis problem?