165 replies to this topic

[50 50]

@Widowmaker1981
Hmm... I am not so sure.
I would not be surprised if the only engines available for the clan, including the iic, are the XL engines.

[Andi Nagasia]

50 50, on 20 November 2015 - 11:48 PM, said:

@Widowmaker1981
Hmm... I am not so sure.
I would not be surprised if the only engines available for the clan, including the iic, are the XL engines.

Nope, i think 2 Orion IIC Variants have STD Engines, still wondering on Clan Engine Costs though,

[PanzerMagier]

IS has something known as a "compact engine"
75% of STD weight. Does exactly what the clan one does. Canon fix.
easy, keeps the canon whiners at bay and it's simple and intuitive with easily adjustable values to balance it on.
Which is exactly why paul will never implement it, has to be something complex like ghost heat. Simple effective changes simply means he has to admit he's wrong and it'll take a long time before he decends from that podium that IGP placed him on. I'm not saying he is to blame but he got to keep his reputation.

[Hotthedd]

PanzerMagier, on 21 November 2015 - 11:30 AM, said:

IS has something known as a "compact engine"
75% of STD weight. Does exactly what the clan one does. Canon fix.
easy, keeps the canon whiners at bay and it's simple and intuitive with easily adjustable values to balance it on.
Which is exactly why paul will never implement it, has to be something complex like ghost heat. Simple effective changes simply means he has to admit he's wrong and it'll take a long time before he decends from that podium that IGP placed him on. I'm not saying he is to blame but he got to keep his reputation.

Compact engines are HEAVIER than Std. engines, but take up less SPACE.

[Andi Nagasia]

PanzerMagier, on 21 November 2015 - 11:30 AM, said:

IS has something known as a "compact engine"
75% of STD weight. Does exactly what the clan one does. Canon fix.
easy, keeps the canon whiners at bay and it's simple and intuitive with easily adjustable values to balance it on.
Which is exactly why paul will never implement it, has to be something complex like ghost heat. Simple effective changes simply means he has to admit he's wrong and it'll take a long time before he decends from that podium that IGP placed him on. I'm not saying he is to blame but he got to keep his reputation.

Um no not really, thats actually called a LFE(Light Fusion Engine)(3062),
the CFE(Compact Fusion Engine)(3069) actually weighs more than a STD but is smaller,

[PanzerMagier]

still a nice idea. screw the timeline, keeping fun things like chemical/heavy/bombast lasers and other cool shtuff out of reach. Sigh. I think the gameplay of MWO could be greatly enriched if we doubled the weapon arsenal. more quirks to make more mechs more cooler.

[Tarl Cabot]

As with many Battletech games, PGI has the ability to alter items to fit within their setting with House rules. Original Mechwarrior, EGA MPBT 3025 on GEnie (which used MW as the basis for its combat engine) and AOL/Gamestorm MPBT Solaris had gyro, sensor, cockpit and engine crits while the other versions did not use them.

PGI, adding/updating its "House" rules, could change how many engine crits it takes to damage the engine shielding enough to shut down a mech's engine. That means they can decide, with the setting, which currently has no actual engine crits, from being 3 engine crits to 4 engine crits to shutdown an engine and set that 1=10%, 2=20%, 3=30%, 4th= engine shuts down due to severe damage its shielding.

[Brandarr Gunnarson]

Once again (continuing this crusade!): We don't need LFE redundant tech/options. We need balance now. Please refer to my posts above.

@Tarl Cabot:

You're exactly right. PGI has control over the house rules. They can change those values to create real balance in their game. And they should! What, with MWO being so vastly different from TT, just let it be its own incarnation; its own Game, already!!!

[Hotthedd]

Brandarr Gunnarson, on 25 November 2015 - 11:50 PM, said:

Once again (continuing this crusade!): We don't need LFE redundant tech/options. We need balance now. Please refer to my posts above.

@Tarl Cabot:

You're exactly right. PGI has control over the house rules. They can change those values to create real balance in their game. And they should! What, with MWO being so vastly different from TT, just let it be its own incarnation; its own Game, already!!!

Once again, as long as you realize that MW:O will lose players over altering the rules too much, and there are ways to balance without such drastic changes.

How many more leaving would be too many?

[Brandarr Gunnarson]

@Hotthedd:

I know you feel strongly about this. That's cool.

But I seriously doubt too many would leave. No doubt some hardcore TT fans would.

I counter: how many casual (Steam?) players would welcome this change?

[Widowmaker1981]

Hotthedd, on 26 November 2015 - 05:45 AM, said:

Once again, as long as you realize that MW:O will lose players over altering the rules too much, and there are ways to balance without such drastic changes.

How many more leaving would be too many?

If people are willing to leave the game purely because it doesnt strictly follow the rules of a game from a completely different genre, then i say good riddance. I doubt it would be that many. Lore =/= TT rules. Lore never says anything about how many STs are required to kill a mech, because in Lore mechs dont have discreet hit locations, they are portrayed as actual real vehicles.

The Tabletop rule of XL engines dying from 1 side torso loss (and Clan XL being 2) was generated in an environment where players cannot choose where they aim. The balance factor of the mechanic is completely altered in MWO, because we CAN aim where we want to. In an of itself that is a reason to re-examine the mechanic.

To be quite f**king honest, if people want a computer game that slavishly follows the rules of classic tabletop Battletech, the HareBrained Schemes Battletech game will be what they want. Its top down and turn based, so the mechanics should translate perfectly.

Edited by Widowmaker1981, 27 November 2015 - 03:54 AM.

[Lily from animove]

Widowmaker1981, on 27 November 2015 - 03:51 AM, said:

To be quite honest, if people are willing to leave the game purely because it doesnt strictly follow the rules of a game from a completely different genre, then good riddance. I doubt it would be that many.

I don't care about the Lore and in terms of "values". The lore is backgroudnstory. But I care about balance because balance is variety and variety is fun. At least fo me. and when this is lost the game is less fun. I am a gamer and I have a LOT more games than I can play, so they all compete against each other wth the "fun" I expect to get them from and will be judged aftewards with the fun I actually had. And with the changes recently and what i see coming this variety=fun judgement is not good.

I understand that some clanchassis needs a nerf to bring then in line with IS chassis, but NEVER at the curent costs of how many other chassis we do sacrifice for this.

PGI made a few great things, new maps and map overhauls. Screens are supossed to do something soon. They make a lot events more than most other MMO's, be get decals soon, which is great and a steam release. That are all good chocies, as well as giving informationwarfare a bit more meaning. But they fiddle around with core aspects that do not need this kind of treatment and which will have a major impact on my fun. I do not belong to those weird crowd of addicted gamers that stick with a single game and throw money at it while they also hate it. I play games I have fun in, and the money I spent is in games I play. So I losely stick around in MWO and see how changes come and go with the hope that this game will one day offer me fun again to play it again and then also spent.

I would just give the IS torso loss survival as well and DONE, sure it interferes with FSE by lore, but WTF? FSE's aren't here so we do not need to balance stuff around nonexisting tech while the existign one cannot work properly. Further more IS has some bullsh*t mechs by geometry as the clanners have. And those need Survival XL's because a bad geometry in a shooter is a basic bad thing. Now when you have an XL with bad consequences or an STD in a still omnipresent easy to hit CT ST mech it make snot even a difference, except if the mech is bad or even more bad. Atlas runs fine in an STD, it has the hitboxes to do so, woudl a clan-like. XL make it OP? I don't think so. because this costs slots and the atlas has more slot issues than actually weight issues. So putting an XL on it would probably just lower irs pew pew by either heat or wepaons able to slap on.

PI makes straneg supercomplex drastic changes that are unnedded. instead make simple drastic changes.

How about this:

delete any clantech, allow IS tech only, for clan and IS mechs, test this 3 weeks on the testserver.
delete any IS tech, allow Clantech only, for clan and IS mechs test this 3 weeks on the testserver.
Allow both techs for BOTH mechs.

THAT would give you feedback and Data about techbalance to each other. Sure it breaks the stockmechs, but WHO cares? it's the testserver, and its for testing thats why people get a craplaod of Cbills and MC to test whatever is possible.

But it will clearly show you which chassis have issues and are bad independend from any tech and also in relation to which tech. Then you try to balance the chassis and release a final test where IS mechs = IS tech and Clantech = Clanmechs again And see if the balance done is good.

[Hotthedd]

Brandarr Gunnarson, on 27 November 2015 - 02:59 AM, said:

@Hotthedd:

I know you feel strongly about this. That's cool.

But I seriously doubt too many would leave. No doubt some hardcore TT fans would.

I counter: how many casual (Steam?) players would welcome this change?

It is not even about this one proposed change. Most people do not leave a game over just one thing, although some do. It is about people leaving over the DIRECTION the game would be going with this change on top of the many others already in the game. There are ways to balance WITHOUT breaking the CORE mechanics of the game on which MW:O claims to be based.

Players have already left because of these changes, and my point is that more will leave with every change that takes MW:O further from the game they based MW:O on. The player base has dwindled to the point that losing even more of the early players is a terrible mistake. In fact, I believe that a better business decision would be to try and RE-capture the audience that has left than try to attract new (and notoriously fickle) players with an unfinished game that has lost its own roots. In short: make the game you promised to make first, THEN go after the new market.

To answer your question: MW:O has yet to pick up its first new player off of Steam. Therefore, the mechanics that these players will see make no difference either way yet. There is no way to quantify if this change would attract even ONE new player, but even you admit it WOULD lose existing players.

In what universe is this considered a good business decision?

Widowmaker1981, on 27 November 2015 - 03:51 AM, said:

If people are willing to leave the game purely because it doesnt strictly follow the rules of a game from a completely different genre, then i say good riddance. I doubt it would be that many. Lore =/= TT rules. Lore never says anything about how many STs are required to kill a mech, because in Lore mechs dont have discreet hit locations, they are portrayed as actual real vehicles.

The Tabletop rule of XL engines dying from 1 side torso loss (and Clan XL being 2) was generated in an environment where players cannot choose where they aim. The balance factor of the mechanic is completely altered in MWO, because we CAN aim where we want to. In an of itself that is a reason to re-examine the mechanic.

To be quite f**king honest, if people want a computer game that slavishly follows the rules of classic tabletop Battletech, the HareBrained Schemes Battletech game will be what they want. Its top down and turn based, so the mechanics should translate perfectly.

I never said that lore = TT rules. However, the rules for TT are a SIMULATION of canon 'mech combat, and MW:O should try to follow the same SIMULATION whenever possible. Making core changes to that SIMULATION has proven to be a mistake that has lost players every time it has happened.

You may have the luxury of having the attitude of saying good riddance to the very segment of the player base that made MW:O possible in the first place, but you are not the one that has to keep the servers running.

You make a good point about the difference in a player being able to reliably hit where they aim in MW:O as opposed to TT. I agree. The fact is that this is one mistake PGI made at the beginning that departed from the TT simulation. It is what has given any player the ability to hit one location with multiple weapons fired simultaneously (which also breaks "lore"). This mistake has led to the only real and consistent "meta" in MW:O game play: Alpha striking boated weapons. Every Band-Aid fix to this has been a result of that step away from both TT and lore.

Instead of embracing Alpha Strike Warrior: Online, PGI should fix this broken mechanic. Alpha strikes should be possible, but not precise.

Most reasonable people will understand that certain aspects cannot be "slavishly" followed, however, they should not be discarded if there IS a viable way to handle it that doesn't fundamentally alter the source game. No doubt that Harebrained Schemes' new game will be expected to have to adhere much more strictly to TT, as it does not have the translation issued that MechWarrior has always had.

PGI seems to realize that there can be a great synergy between the two games. That would mean NOT having completely different rules for handling XL engines.

[DivineEvil]

Lily from animove, on 27 November 2015 - 04:48 AM, said:

I would just give the IS torso loss survival as well and DONE

And DONE, Standard engines are not used anymore. Here's your love for variety thrown out of the window.

Same goes for other points, like the Atlas. 4x Crit Slot limitations will not prevent it from equipping anything, while lighter engine would provide 15-16,5 additional tonnage. The fact, that destruction of two STs will kill it is not going to change anything, because most people ignore CT weapons anyway and otherwise can't do much with them anyway. Thus, IS Standard engine will become the same redundant junk-for-sale, just like the Single Heatsinks currently are.

[Widowmaker1981]

Hotthedd, on 27 November 2015 - 07:15 AM, said:

I never said that lore = TT rules. However, the rules for TT are a SIMULATION of canon 'mech combat, and MW:O should try to follow the same SIMULATION whenever possible. Making core changes to that SIMULATION has proven to be a mistake that has lost players every time it has happened.

You may have the luxury of having the attitude of saying good riddance to the very segment of the player base that made MW:O possible in the first place, but you are not the one that has to keep the servers running.

You make a good point about the difference in a player being able to reliably hit where they aim in MW:O as opposed to TT. I agree. The fact is that this is one mistake PGI made at the beginning that departed from the TT simulation. It is what has given any player the ability to hit one location with multiple weapons fired simultaneously (which also breaks "lore"). This mistake has led to the only real and consistent "meta" in MW:O game play: Alpha striking boated weapons. Every Band-Aid fix to this has been a result of that step away from both TT and lore.

Instead of embracing Alpha Strike Warrior: Online, PGI should fix this broken mechanic. Alpha strikes should be possible, but not precise.

Most reasonable people will understand that certain aspects cannot be "slavishly" followed, however, they should not be discarded if there IS a viable way to handle it that doesn't fundamentally alter the source game. No doubt that Harebrained Schemes' new game will be expected to have to adhere much more strictly to TT, as it does not have the translation issued that MechWarrior has always had.

PGI seems to realize that there can be a great synergy between the two games. That would mean NOT having completely different rules for handling XL engines.

You still havent given a reason for why it would be a bad change in this game, other than 'its not like TT' - unless we completely remove player aim from the equation and randomise damage location on hit, no amount of changing the maximum allowable alpha will change the fact that a player can repeatedly aim at a side torso to kill a mech, unlike in TT where it is random. Even if they are chainfiring one weapon at a time, it STILL breaks the TT damage model, and renders the XL engine balance suspect.

Since its the single biggest stumbling block to attaining Clan/IS balance (which is again contrary to lore, but is needed due to the difference between a tabletop game where 1 human has many mechs and an FPS where 1 human = 1 mech), i see no reason we shouldn't revist this paradigm.

Edited by Widowmaker1981, 27 November 2015 - 07:34 AM.

[Widowmaker1981]

DivineEvil, on 27 November 2015 - 07:31 AM, said:

And DONE, Standard engines are not used anymore. Here's your love for variety thrown out of the window.

Same goes for other points, like the Atlas. 4x Crit Slot limitations will not prevent it from equipping anything, while lighter engine would provide 15-16,5 additional tonnage. The fact, that destruction of two STs will kill it is not going to change anything, because most people ignore CT weapons anyway and otherwise can't do much with them anyway. Thus, IS Standard engine will become the same redundant junk-for-sale, just like the Single Heatsinks currently are.

Give standard engines a buff of Engine Rating divided by 10 structure points to CT, LT and RT at the same time. I guarantee you, some people will use standards.

Stalker for example. Low engine cap, high tonnage. Can comfortably run a max size standard, so why use an XL and have less room for heatsinks?

Edited by Widowmaker1981, 27 November 2015 - 07:38 AM.

[Lily from animove]

DivineEvil, on 27 November 2015 - 07:31 AM, said:

And DONE, Standard engines are not used anymore. Here's your love for variety thrown out of the window.

Same goes for other points, like the Atlas. 4x Crit Slot limitations will not prevent it from equipping anything, while lighter engine would provide 15-16,5 additional tonnage. The fact, that destruction of two STs will kill it is not going to change anything, because most people ignore CT weapons anyway and otherwise can't do much with them anyway. Thus, IS Standard engine will become the same redundant junk-for-sale, just like the Single Heatsinks currently are.

STD's would still be used because ou can still survive BOTH torso losses. Also some Some mechs have slot issues and therefore you do not go XL for slot reasons.

Also, when this si the only argument, then WOW? what about SHS? they are and willa lways be dead, Some things in the IS was always a pure upgrade instead of a tradoff.

Id love to salvage a STD for my DWF.

Further there could be more buffs for STD engines. Why does balance always have to mean cripple 10 things to adjust 2things? That is not balance that is just shifting one balance Problem somewhere else. Solutions don't shift problems, they solve them.

[Hotthedd]

Widowmaker1981, on 27 November 2015 - 07:32 AM, said:

You still havent given a reason for why it would be a bad change in this game, other than 'its not like TT' - unless we completely remove player aim from the equation and randomise damage location on hit, no amount of changing the maximum allowable alpha will change the fact that a player can repeatedly aim at a side torso to kill a mech, unlike in TT where it is random. Even if they are chainfiring one weapon at a time, it STILL breaks the TT damage model, and renders the XL engine balance suspect.

Au contraire mon frère. A player COULD aim for any component in TT, and pilot skill was one of the modifiers. Not to mention damage spread was NOT random, as 2D6 is a PROBABILITY generator, not a RANDOM NUMBER generator. Precise chainfire, therefore, does NOT break the TT mechanic, it merely places pilot aiming skill squarely on the pilots' shoulders.

My reason is that SINCE it unnecessarily moves AWAY from TT rules, people who invested into this game based on the promise that as "A BattleTech Game" it would attempt to adhere to these rules whenever possible, people (who are already disillusioned with the arcade direction MW:O is choosing) will leave. For some it would be the last straw. (For some it would be the second to last straw).

Widowmaker1981, on 27 November 2015 - 07:32 AM, said:

Since its the single biggest stumbling block to attaining Clan/IS balance (which is again contrary to lore, but is needed due to the difference between a tabletop game where 1 human has many mechs and an FPS where 1 human = 1 mech), i see no reason we shouldn't revist this paradigm.

There are ways to balance the engines WITHOUT making the ISXL into something it was never meant to be. It seems that PGI is going to test out a heat and movement penalty for cXL ST loss. This is a better way to solve the problem. (Add in a crit system for engines and gyros and we will be even closer)

[dearthcmo]

I for one like that they are different; makes you weigh what you want more. Leave it alone.

[Tarl Cabot]

DivineEvil, on 27 November 2015 - 07:31 AM, said:

And DONE, Standard engines are not used anymore. Here's your love for variety thrown out of the window.

Same goes for other points, like the Atlas. 4x Crit Slot limitations will not prevent it from equipping anything, while lighter engine would provide 15-16,5 additional tonnage. The fact, that destruction of two STs will kill it is not going to change anything, because most people ignore CT weapons anyway and otherwise can't do much with them anyway. Thus, IS Standard engine will become the same redundant junk-for-sale, just like the Single Heatsinks currently are.

Not true on STD engines, as they would not be hit with any penalties. Currently the IS-XL, it would be heat penalty but due to 1 more engine crit the penalty would be greater then a C-XL. And as per PTS4, if that movement penalty goes live then IS-XL would have a greater penalty. If the LFE is ever introduced it would be closer to the C-XL with the exception of 1/4 weight savings instead of 1/2 weight savings.

And seriously, an altered IS-XL would slightly benefit the current CW-preferred some meds/heavy/assault IS-vomit mechs in both increase speed and a 1/2 more heatsinks. Then the choice would be to risk the penalty or go slower/hotter. Not real change there.

The altered IS-XL would benefit the non-preferred mechs with both a slight boost in speed and heavier weapons, cause they sure are not laser-vomit machines. A couple may become more viable for CW, or not suck as much, while for normal game play it would mean increasing their TTK.

Making more mechs viable overall benefits both the community and PGI. With the amount of information in the forums, the mechs suggestions to start out on, etc, funneling players to fewer chassis' means fewer sales across the board. And making said change would also open the door to make changes to omni's, especially those considered lower tiered that would benefit more from changes.

And if PGI keeps to its guns of no crosstech, no "salvage", then the Clans will be safe from T-bolts boating C-ERML. And with PGI introducing the actual garrison Clan battlemechs, that in itself could be considered the test run, but at this point of the game I actually prefer PGI tweaks things like the IS-XL to be a worse version of the C-XL while keeping the actual tech, the flavor of the Clans and IS separated.

In the end though, all each of us can do is discuss it, as PGI will make what changes they decide on. Unfortunately the initial setup and previous changes as been more about providing only half the equation, if that, then follow up with off-kilter changes.

Edited by Tarl Cabot, 27 November 2015 - 02:26 PM.