413 replies to this topic

[ScarecrowES]

Satan n stuff, on 06 May 2016 - 01:54 PM, said:

All of the methods you conveniently forgot to mention give a different result. I'm not sure if you're aware, but coastlines aren't straight and they don't just roll out a giant tape measure to get the right number, they don"t even measure the same at different times of the day. Coastlines are measured point to point and that will produce completely different numbers depending on how many points you use to measure and exactly where you place them, making it the perfect comparison to my proposed measurement, so try again.

As far as your pseudo-mathematical drivel goes, do you really believe that the numbers would resolve the same as total surface area, when half of most mech's features don't even contribute to the profile unless they happen to be sticking out to a side when you're looking at them? Those little bits tacked on to mech torsos like arms, guns, legs, they all have very high surface areas compared to the whole thing especially when looking at the combined total, but they add very little to the profile, only about one and a half leg and and a fraction of everything else on average.
Please come up with a mathematical proof if you think there's a direct correlation between total surface area and profile, otherwise stop spouting nonsense. I'll give you one hint, it doesn't exist because there is no such thing.

About the Blackjack specifically, I don't particularly care if it gets bigger or smaller, I have hundreds of mechs so I'm not going to worry that one of them might be a little weaker. What I am worried about is PGI rescaling all the mechs in a way that might make entire weight classes useless and will completely screw over chassis whose size are the only thing they have going for them. But of course being a mathematical genius as you are, surely you already saw the big picture, right?

Well, you said it was LITERALLY IMPOSSIBLE. Now by your own admission, it's literally possible - now with the caveat of producing different results. Here's a question though... the different results... even though they produce different absolute values, would they still produce values that would have the same relative ratio if you compared two bits of coastline? Like, would the coastline of Australia and the coastline of New Zealand somehow change position if you used one method versus the other? I mean, no matter what system you used, Australia is still going to be listed with the longer coastline, right?

I mean, c'mon. Please reach more.

And as for profile versus surface area versus volume, I've really been over all this. I even brought pictures. There's nothing "pseudo" about the math. I've even addressed the practical result of using profile versus pure surface area on the elimination of erroneous surfaces, and how that would compare to volume. Hint - excluding erroneous surfaces from the surface area of an object actually makes the surface area and volume ratios closer. So if you COULD quantify an infinite series of profiles of a 3d object, it would more consistently produce ratios more in keeping with volume than a pure surface area ratio would. *GASP*

You, know, it's funny... I'd always believed that Math must have been an invention of Satan himself, but alas, that seems not to be true.

So, you want some proof between the relationship between profile and surface area and volume... some actual hard math. Ok, I'll bite.

Let's look at this relationship with a fairly simple object, a sphere. I don't want to go any more complicated than that since this is just a basic example, and I don't want to go over the slight differences produced by the impact of different shapes. Suffice it to say, we're going to use a basic shape, scale it up, and see what results we get from the ratios of profile, surface area, and volume between two examples.

Ok, so, I'm going to use two spheres. The first has a radius of 5, and the second a radius of 6.

You have the following equations to consider:

• Area. This would, in effect, be the profile of a sphere if you viewed it from one angle. Area = pi times radius squared.
• Volume. V= four-thirds times pi times radius cubed
• Ratio of surface area and volume of a sphere. SA/V = 3 divided by the radius.

So... for the profile, we'll take a picture of both spheres from 12 different views - the same exact views for both. 12 is a fairly arbitrary choice, it could be any number, but 12 is a good number. Like a 12-sided die. The result will be basically be 12 different depictions of the area of the sphere as taken from those angles. For the sphere, this results in the same area from every view, but the results would be the same for any shape.

So, for the two spheres we get the following set of numbers.

Radius of the sphere =5
Area of the circle (profile) = 78.5375
Surface area of the sphere= 314.15
Volume of the sphere= 523.5833
Surface area to Volume ratio = 0.6
12x profile surface area = 942.45
12x profile to standard surface area differential =3
12x profile surface area to Volume ratio = 1.8
12x profile and surface area to volume differential= 3

Radius of the sphere =6
Area of the circle (profile) = 113.094
Surface area of the sphere= 452.376
Volume of the sphere= 904.752
Surface area to Volume ratio = 0.5
12x profile surface area = 1357.128
12x profile to standard surface area differential =3
12x profile surface area to Volume ratio = 1.5
12x profile and surface area to volume differential= 3

Uh oh, looks like the hard math is against you here. It doesn't matter if you try to quantify 12 different profiles of the sphere, go just by surface area, or go by volume, the results are the exact same mathematical ratios.

The ratio of surface area to volume, as well as all these other basic geometry equations, were established in math thousands of years ago. I assume we can just accept those as pure truth.

As I've shown here, using a predefined set of profiles will produce a quantity that will have a fixed ratio to the actual surface area of the set of objects (in this case that differential was that the profile views produced a number that was exactly 3x the actual surface area). And, of course, the profile area to volume ratio was also exactly 3 times the normal value. There will be a certain amount of deviation between the profiles and the actual surface area, but that deviation will only result in the elimination of surfaces that do not contribute to volume. Thus, profile is probably more accurate to volume than pure surface area is to volume.

So if we scaled all mechs using a process like I've done here, basically taking a limited number of profiles and quantifying the basic area of the shapes it produces to coalate a sort of surface area measurement, it would produce a scale that would have the same relative results as if you just did it by surface area or by volume.

Except, here's the thing... you've just demonstrated that you're wasting your time doing profiles, since it's just going to spit out surface area anyway. You can just get get that right from your modeling software and it'd take a mere few seconds. You've also just demonstrated that profiles work better than surface area because it eliminates junk surfaces from your consideration. Of course, measuring by volume already does that. And, like surface area, we can just open our model file and get the volume of that model in seconds.

Sooooo, ergo and ipso facto...

VOLUME, is by far the smartest, easiest, most effing fool-proof and objective way to do this. So sayeth the maths. But even if it wasn't, any objective standard will yield the same relative result. It's just going to get you there a LOT slower.

And please, explain to me again how there's no correlation between surface area and profile. You were spouting off something about "nonsense" and "doesn't exist." Cuz, I dunno... that math up there? Pretty definitively says there is.

Edited by ScarecrowES, 06 May 2016 - 06:49 PM.

[Davers]

All this talk of surface area and volume. *sigh* Doesn't matter if PGI finds the perfect mathematical size. Quirks aren't done by math. They are done by 'what feels right'. So even if everything is 'properly sized', the big deciding factor will be quirks.

[ScarecrowES]

Davers, on 06 May 2016 - 07:04 PM, said:

All this talk of surface area and volume. *sigh* Doesn't matter if PGI finds the perfect mathematical size. Quirks aren't done by math. They are done by 'what feels right'. So even if everything is 'properly sized', the big deciding factor will be quirks.

Very true... but, getting the mech scaling mathematically correct eliminates one more factor that needs to be compensated for by quirks.

[Wintersdark]

Davers, on 06 May 2016 - 07:04 PM, said:

All this talk of surface area and volume. *sigh* Doesn't matter if PGI finds the perfect mathematical size. Quirks aren't done by math. They are done by 'what feels right'. So even if everything is 'properly sized', the big deciding factor will be quirks.

That's true. But at least everything will be properly sized. That's important to many, whether it is for you or not.

And once everything is the correct size, at least then you can use quirks after that.

It's one fewer thing done by "what feels right". Just because we have to have some things done by randomness, doesn't mean everything has to be done by randomness.

Edited by Wintersdark, 06 May 2016 - 07:26 PM.

[Xocoyol Zaraoul]

Rampage, on 30 April 2016 - 01:48 PM, said:

I do not really understand what those that want the Blackjack to stay the same size and have the other Mechs scaled to it think it will accomplish.

Having all mechs shrink will mechanically increase range (and speed), in a way, as the relative distances increase. Having all mechs grow is the inverse of this.

If for example the average mech is X size, and suddenly shrinks to 1/2 X size, then when in the cockpit it will feel like the range for weapons have doubled as you have to be twice as close to your target for them to take up the "original" amount of your reticule. This will also alter your perception of speed, as shrinking mechs will make the game seem faster (Imagine being a person going 100kph, compared to a Raven mech, compared to a Battleship, same principle applies when comparing ranges)

Personally I am ambivalent on this, but changing the size of the average mech will have a proportional impact on relative range, as the relative target sizes will change.

I don't care whether the average size increases or decreases, I'm just happy that we will have a "standard" and thus one less variable for possible balance tweaks.

Edited by Xocoyol Zaraoul, 06 May 2016 - 10:59 PM.

[Satan n stuff]

ScarecrowES, on 06 May 2016 - 06:33 PM, said:

Congratulations, you know basic geometry, now how about logic, are your two spheres not going to overlap at certain ranges of angles? Looks like you fail again. Putting simple math out there with no understanding of what it actually represents does not help your case.

[Ghriszly]

Ive always thought the mechs were a bit big all around. Looking at modern tanks and comparing sizes to mechs is a joke. An abrams MBT weights roughly 70 tons but is about the same size as a mech thats half its weight. Maybe the materials used in this timeframe are far lighter but it seems off to me.

[oldradagast]

MightyGhrisz, on 07 May 2016 - 01:49 AM, said:

Ive always thought the mechs were a bit big all around. Looking at modern tanks and comparing sizes to mechs is a joke. An abrams MBT weights roughly 70 tons but is about the same size as a mech thats half its weight. Maybe the materials used in this timeframe are far lighter but it seems off to me.

If I recall, all non-Light mechs are a bit too large, and that's based on Lore. Lights, oddly, are often too small. Several of them would not be able to fit a human pilot in their cockpit based on their current size. You can also notice that Lights in general currently have a "shrinking bonus" applied to their size that makes them rather smaller than they should be. Compare a 35-ton Jenner to a 40-ton Cicada and you'll see what I mean.

Now, this is NOT a call to make Lights huge, all mechs tiny, or something else. It is just a statement of fact and something that will need to be kept in mind when doing the rescaling. Lights were made small for a reason - to avoid them dying stupidly fast. If they are now going to be normalized, they will need quirks to keep them alive.

[Zibmo]

ScarecrowES, on 30 April 2016 - 12:05 PM, said:

The Shadowhawk is less than 2% off from it's correct volume... so assume that the SH provides a good baseline for what humanoid 55-tonners will look like by volume.

Wow. Because it's one of the taller mechs in the game.

[Zibmo]

RampancyTW, on 06 May 2016 - 09:46 AM, said:

No, they picked a volume/tonnage ratio that involves scaling down several mechs and scaling up others. Many lights are, in fact, getting smaller.

Threads like this giant crap fest are precisely why we don't see devs around very often.

And if they simply shared, the commentary might be a little less speculative and more <I hope> based on reason. If we want to be "objective" instead of "objecting", we need the tools.

I am simply afraid that they are not paying enough attention to the details (here comes that MVP again) and are going to roll out something as bad as the quirk pass last year. The first one. Where you had mechs that "statistically" torso twisted to the left when twisting right.

ScarecrowES, on 06 May 2016 - 11:27 AM, said:

Ugh... sorry for all the consecutive posts folks... replying to multiple comments and the forum is not combining my posts as it usually would.



I was using the analogy given, and it very clearly works. The Blackjack weighs 45 tons. That means it has significantly less armor and internals than a 55-ton mech, which is the heaviest in the medium class. The Blackjack has a total possible armor value of 306 to the Shadowhawk's 370. The Shadowhawk has 120% of the armor of the Blackjack, at only 10 tons more. The Blackjack is not going to be able to take the hits that the Shadowhawk can take. Or at least it shouldn't.

If you don't have the ability to take a hit like the heavier mechs in your class, then you need to make up for that in other ways. You either forgo some weapons and pile on speed so you can get out of trouble, or you accept that you're fragile and pile on the guns, hoping to maximize the damage to the enemy before he takes you out. The Blackjack goes with the whole "slow and heavily-armed" choice. But it isn't being punished for it by being a glass cannon, as it should be... With quirks sitting where they are NOW, and with its extraordinarily small size, the Blackjack is probably the most survivable IS medium.

So the Blackjack... slow, can't take a hit, but packs a punch. This is going to be the kicker on the team. But you want to use it as a lineman against other linemen. By all rights, it should be getting its head knocked off. It's kinda not. That's a bad thing.

93 is slow? I regularly run down lights with it. In fact, that's generally what I use it for, along with poking.

So no, I don't think the Blackjack is being played like a lineman.

[Davers]

ScarecrowES, on 06 May 2016 - 07:12 PM, said:

Very true... but, getting the mech scaling mathematically correct eliminates one more factor that needs to be compensated for by quirks.

Wintersdark, on 06 May 2016 - 07:25 PM, said:

That's true. But at least everything will be properly sized. That's important to many, whether it is for you or not.


And once everything is the correct size, at least then you can use quirks after that.


It's one fewer thing done by "what feels right". Just because we have to have some things done by randomness, doesn't mean everything has to be done by randomness.

Having all the mechs 'scaled right' is one of the problems- it's why assault mechs are huge, but need massive quirks to be viable. Basing important 'combat attributes', like how large your mech is, on tonnage would imply that heavier mechs are inherently more powerful. But time and again we see that is not the case with many lighter mechs being flat out superior to their larger cousins.

Ignoring gameplay and just using a formula and a spreadsheet to balance the game doesn't work. It didn't work with the great normalization of lasers and there is no guarantee that it will actually improve the game at all. I just find this method very Procustean.

[Wintersdark]

Davers, on 07 May 2016 - 06:50 AM, said:

Having all the mechs 'scaled right' is one of the problems- it's why assault mechs are huge, but need massive quirks to be viable. Basing important 'combat attributes', like how large your mech is, on tonnage would imply that heavier mechs are inherently more powerful. But time and again we see that is not the case with many lighter mechs being flat out superior to their larger cousins.

Going on about light:medium:heavy:assault balance is useless. That's not a problem of size, even though I accept that size totally does matter. An Assault mech SHOULD BE substantially larger than a light. The difference in in-game performance should be made up elsewhere, not in making Assaults smaller and lights larger, or whatever else.

I recognize this impacts balance. But this is necessary for this to be a Battletech game. There are LOTS of things that Simply Are Required, even though they make balance harder.

After all, we could just most of the different chassis, and redesign the rest to all have similar hardpoint locations. That sure would make balance easier. Give them the same hardpoint options, too, why not?

Fundamentally change how a lot of weapons work while you're at it too.

Quote

Ignoring gameplay and just using a formula and a spreadsheet to balance the game doesn't work.

You're missing the point; or rather, imagining your own point and trying to fit what's happening to that.

This rescaling isn't "using a spreadsheet to balance the game". That isn't what's happening here at all. Even saying that shows you just don't understand what's going on in the first place. This rescaling is making mechs the size they should be based on their weight. That's the beginning, and the end. This won't balance the game. It WILL make future balancing easier, though, because going forwards they can start with the knowledge that the mech is the correct size, so if it's still weak, it isn't weak because it's too big. So, other changes need to be made.

Quote

It didn't work with the great normalization of lasers and there is no guarantee that it will actually improve the game at all. I just find this method very Procustean.

There is never a garauntee that anything will improve the game.

The "great normalization of lasers" never happened; that's simply BS. They "Normalized" pulse lasers once, a long time ago (before Pulse Lasers where ever good), but what they did there has no bearing on scale by volume, none whatsoever. Very loose application of the word "normalization" is not correlation. That pulse laser change was meant to be the first step in rebalancing pulse lasers, to make them not suck. The next step didn't happen for a long time and was basically not a "next step" at all, but rather Russ taking over weapon balance from Paul and making his own changes. Anyways, so utterly different and unrelated that it doesn't bear mentioning at all.

This isn't a "first step" in mech rescaling. It's the only step. It's not directly meant to bring balance; it's meant to make all the mechs the correct size. Correct doesn't mean balanced overall, it just means that the mechs will be the size they should be based on their weight.



Besides; this is if nothing else the total opposite of Procustean. All the mechs will fit their respective beds just perfectly =)

[Davers]

Wintersdark, on 07 May 2016 - 07:08 AM, said:

It is 'balancing by spreadsheet' when you say "all 45 ton mechs should be x volume" and then adjust the mechs to make that so. And these numbers ARE picked arbitrarily. They could have easily decided that the Hunchback was the 'perfect sized' 50 ton mech and built around that, rather than the Centurion- a mech that the community voted was too large and needed to be resized.

*shrug* At the end of the day the Blackjack is a 45 ton mech that cannot shield it's torsos. We will see how it does being larger.

[Wintersdark]

Davers, on 07 May 2016 - 08:44 AM, said:

It is 'balancing by spreadsheet' when you say &quot;all 45 ton mechs should be x volume&quot; and then adjust the mechs to make that so. And these numbers ARE picked arbitrarily. They could have easily decided that the Hunchback was the 'perfect sized' 50 ton mech and built around that, rather than the Centurion- a mech that the community voted was too large and needed to be resized.

The reference point is picked essentially arbitrarily but that doesn't really matter. Overall average mech size has been discussed already.

And, incidentally, the Hunchback was the reference volume(or, rather, matched the defence volume, which was the overall average density), not the centurion.

Whatever it is, what's important - and not necessarily for balance, but for consistency - is that mechs are the appropriate size for their tonnage. That will be the case. Any balance problems from there can be addressed via quirks.

There is no alternative. Unless you're only arguing that the reference density should just be lower, so more mechs shrink and fewer grow(for example, matching the Blackjack, and seeing the Hunchback and every other mech shrink a bit more). There's a good argument that that would improve the game in some ways, but as I said to Ultimax earlier that's got downsides too. Doesn't matter anymore though because it's already decided and done.

Quote

*shrug* At the end of the day the Blackjack is a 45 ton mech that cannot shield it's torsos. We will see how it does being larger.

"Larger "

Do you know how much? Maybe 2%, 3% larger by volume? Maybe more, maybe less. Will the Blackjack get WORSE? Maybe. Depends if the size difference is even noticeable or not.

Honestly though I don't give even one f&%£ what happens to the blackjack. It's just one mech, and it's very strong right now anyways. If it gets a bit worse - and the worst case scenario here is only a little worse - so be it. It can afford it without becoming trash.

Lots of other mech's will get better.

But more importantly, there will finally be consistent mech scaling.That is what I care about.

Individual mechs? No. What's good and bad there will change every time they decide to requirk, or change weapons, or anything really. Mech balance changes all the damn time, so bunching panties because your pet baby is getting worse is silly. It'll happen sooner or later anyways.

[ScarecrowES]

Satan n stuff, on 06 May 2016 - 11:50 PM, said:

Congratulations, you know basic geometry, now how about logic, are your two spheres not going to overlap at certain ranges of angles? Looks like you fail again. Putting simple math out there with no understanding of what it actually represents does not help your case.

You're just pulling stuff out of your *** now. Please stop.

You wanted proof of math you said didn't exist. I just proved it did. I'm thinking YOU are having a hard time understanding what it represents.

Zibmo, on 07 May 2016 - 06:12 AM, said:

Wow. Because it's one of the taller mechs in the game.

Taller, yes, but very thin.

Zibmo, on 07 May 2016 - 06:18 AM, said:

93 is slow? I regularly run down lights with it. In fact, that's generally what I use it for, along with poking.

So no, I don't think the Blackjack is being played like a lineman.

For a medium mech... especially one at the lighter end of the class, yes, 93 is slow. And most people aren't even running the Blackjack at 93. The Blackjack trades speed (which it needs to be survivable at that weight) for guns.

[ScarecrowES]

Davers, on 07 May 2016 - 08:44 AM, said:

It is 'balancing by spreadsheet' when you say "all 45 ton mechs should be x volume" and then adjust the mechs to make that so. And these numbers ARE picked arbitrarily. They could have easily decided that the Hunchback was the 'perfect sized' 50 ton mech and built around that, rather than the Centurion- a mech that the community voted was too large and needed to be resized.

*shrug* At the end of the day the Blackjack is a 45 ton mech that cannot shield it's torsos. We will see how it does being larger.

I hope at this point you understand that PGI is not picking a perfect mech at each tonnage to stand for that tonnage's reference point.

Every mech is scaled to a single chosen reference point. It really doesn't matter where that reference is set... the result is the same. All mechs will end up the same size relative to each other.

The reality is, the Centurion is within 2% of its correct volume because the reference PGI chose made it so. This is the same reference point that says the Warhawk and Direwolf are 8% too large, the Catapult was something like 12% too large, and the Nova was a massive 18% too large. Not to mention all the rest that are getting shrunk.

It should feel good to know that whatever reference PGI took, that it's resulting in a normalization that doesn't push the total scale of the stable in either direction in relationship to the game world. It's not as though the average has shrunk or grown.

[Satan n stuff]

ScarecrowES, on 07 May 2016 - 10:11 AM, said:

You're just pulling stuff out of your *** now. Please stop.

You wanted proof of math you said didn't exist. I just proved it did. I'm thinking YOU are having a hard time understanding what it represents.

Tell me where it accounts for overlapping profiles or irregularly shaped objects, go ahead. The fact that you fail to grasp the limitations of the very simple formulae you're using is proof enough that your opinion on this matter is invalid. You've also failed to explain at any point exactly how a volume based scale would be balanced in any way.

[Davers]

Wintersdark, on 07 May 2016 - 09:53 AM, said:

And, incidentally, the Hunchback was the reference volume(or, rather, matched the defence volume, which was the overall average density), not the centurion.

ScarecrowES, on 07 May 2016 - 10:22 AM, said:

The reality is, the Centurion is within 2% of its correct volume because the reference PGI chose made it so.

One of you is wrong.

Wintersdark, on 07 May 2016 - 09:53 AM, said:

Lots of other mech's will get better.

Pure speculation. We don't know if 'lots of mechs' are getting better or not. We know of a few mentioned that will get reduced, and even less that are getting larger. But almost every mech will be getting changes and we don't know what most of them will be.

And since the mechs that are 'getting better' may have their quirks reduced to compensate, I am not sure 'better' is the correct term to use.

[cazidin]

So. What are we arguing about again?

[ScarecrowES]

Satan n stuff, on 07 May 2016 - 10:30 AM, said:

Tell me where it accounts for overlapping profiles or irregularly shaped objects, go ahead. The fact that you fail to grasp the limitations of the very simple formulae you're using is proof enough that your opinion on this matter is invalid. You've also failed to explain at any point exactly how a volume based scale would be balanced in any way.

So... "where it accounts." What 'It' are we talking about here? Because at this point we've talked about so much I'm not even sure what you're trying to refute, and it's becoming tedious.

There's no such thing as "overlapping profiles" when we're looking at a single object. You've just got a profile. It can't overlap itself.

And regardless... we've discussed the relationship of profile to surface area to volume. We've discussed how each deals with shapes, erroneous geometry, etc.

And noone is saying volume is balance. Rescale is not happening for the sake of balance. It has NOTHING to do with balance. It has everything to do with producing a baseline that can be balanced FROM. The fact that you're even talking about balance in a discussion about scale is a problem.

But, from a relative perspective, having all mechs represent their actual tonnage will likely improve balance by default over a system of trying to compensate - by feels - for models that vary from an ideal standard scale by as much as 18%. Just sayin'.