36 replies to this topic

[Felicitatem Parco]

So, 2 Assault Mechs with plentiful low energy hardpoints and lots of quirks.

One is top tier, one is pretty darn low on the ladder.

Does it all come down to Narrow vs. Fat?

[N a p e s]

Black Knight is a heavy...

[MechWarrior414712]

^But it plays like an assault mech. Firepower and tankiness wise at least.

[Gas Guzzler]

The Awesome is fat and slow, that's why. After the re-scale things might be a bit different... but then it will lose its quirks so... its a lose-lose. Also, the Awesome has a dismal engine cap, it's 65 kph top speed compared to the typical 81 of the Black Knight is pretty poor.

Edited by Gas Guzzler, 02 May 2016 - 12:03 PM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Prosperity Park, on 02 May 2016 - 11:57 AM, said:

Does it all come down to Narrow vs. Fat?

No, quirks are another problem, before the structure nerf, the BK had more effective health in the torsos (especially since it is narrow) that allows it to sponge more damage, especially given the hitboxes/profile (technically even after the nerf has more effective health). Then you have to consider the fact the 8Q lacks the nice 15% duration quirk the 7-L does, and then you have to also consider the fact that the 8Q has 1 less hardpoint and has a small engine cap of STD 300.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 02 May 2016 - 12:04 PM.

[C E Dwyer]

Hit boxes and quirks make a mech nothing else

[N a p e s]

The Mech Daddy, on 02 May 2016 - 11:59 AM, said:

^But it plays like an assault mech. Firepower and tankiness wise at least.

In truth you're right and I was just being nitpicky. The 5 ton difference between the 2 doesn't actually make a huge difference in terms of potential loadouts and armor.

So what does that leave? Well the differences between 3D models are already alluded to in the OP and they're probably the biggest factor but in most variants the BK can equip a much larger engine and can also boat many more lasers than the Awesome. And of course, quirks.

[AztecD]

BK has a slim design as to the walking barn door that is the awesome 8q

but the 8q just has a masochistic vibe i cant seem to shake

[LT. HARDCASE]

The AWS-9M actually has a decent engine cap of 385, maybe it'd be a slightly better comparison.

The AWS with the pitiful cap of 300 just suck, and the rescale won't save them.

[Deathlike]

I get the feeling if the BK (any variant) and Awesome-8Q were fighting each other AND they were unquirked, the edge would very likely go to the Black Knight (oh so slightly) due to the Awesome being too easy to hit and having a really terrible engine cap (BK would still run XL generally - a slow STD engine would be OK at that point I guess).

The Awesome has a terrible time of shielding itself (like, how you do hide the barn's sides with its current arm hitboxes?) so you're asking for trouble.

There's technically no legit reason to keep the 300-engine only Awesomes down by not allowing an engine cap increase to 350.

Edited by Deathlike, 02 May 2016 - 02:35 PM.

[MechWarrior5152251]

Fat chicks have been crying about this injustice of Thin over Fat for hundreds of years.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Deathlike, on 02 May 2016 - 02:35 PM, said:

There's technically no legit reason to keep the 300-engine only Awesomes down by not allowing an engine cap increase to 375.

FTFY, it needs to be able to run a larger engine than the BK to have a chance at keeping up.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 02 May 2016 - 02:40 PM.

[oldradagast]

Cathy, on 02 May 2016 - 12:03 PM, said:

Hit boxes and quirks make a mech nothing else

I would also argue that hardpoints, both placement and type, make a huge difference. However, in this case, they are effectively identical, with both mechs in question having nearly nothing but low-mounted energy hardpoints.

Why the difference in performance?

As others have said, quirks and hitboxes are really what matters. The Awesome has horrible hitboxes. In truth, it is not that oversized for an 80-ton mech, but it is still somewhat too big and, more importantly, its torsos are stupidly easy to blast off at any range. The Black Knight, on the other hand is - if anything - a bit small for a 75-ton mech and has good hitboxes.

There's also the quirks. Awesome 8Q is quirked for PPC's and wields them reasonably well... but they STILL suck compared to laser vomit backed up by quirks, even if the mech using the laser vomit has less quirks than the PPC mech.

So, yeah... This discussion is a good one since it puts a glaring spotlight on the miserable state of mech balance and how it takes so little to make a huge difference in mech performance.

Edited by oldradagast, 02 May 2016 - 03:10 PM.

[S 0 L E N Y A]

The Mech Daddy, on 02 May 2016 - 11:59 AM, said:

^But it plays like an assault mech. Firepower and tankiness wise at least.

It is also faster and more agile than some IS mediums when built correctly.
Putting a large XL in a BK is par for the course.
Putting an XL in an awesome is just begging for trouble.

So back to the OP - comes down to size and location of hit boxes.

On a related note: I get the idea and impetus for ballance between IS and Clans, and I understand PGIs motivation (sales) for trying to make every chasis "viable." But on a practical note- do we really need that? What is wrong with having some designs ostensibly superior to others? Seems pretty realistic to me.

[Lightfoot]

Awesome was made too wide. If that were fixed it would out perform the Black Knight.

[dervishx5]

MechWarrior5152251, on 02 May 2016 - 02:39 PM, said:

Fat chicks have been crying about this injustice of Thin over Fat for hundreds of years.

Well actually- no Derv, do not derail the thread with historical corrections.

The Awesome always has tabletop. There it kicks the **** out of the black knight.

Edited by dervishx5, 02 May 2016 - 03:29 PM.

[Zordicron]

Simple.
Top of class heavy > bottom of class assault (I mean tonnage)

It can be argued that top of class medium > bottom of class heavy for that matter.


Once that is taken into account, The real difference is hitboxes. The engine cap stuff etc is sort of a meh point as an 80 ton mech has a crappy engine efficiency built in for the most part compared to a 75 ton heavy. Basically, the Awesome gets to use it's bonus 5 tons 100% into engine to match the speed of the Black Knight. (given STD engine which I presume one would use to capitalize on toughness) given the 300-range-ish of engine size. Amusingly, it is the same situation for say, a Shadowhawk vs a Dragon in the same engine size-ish range. This of course means the firepower pod space available in the end is mostly the same, give or take a ton.

PGI has in it's genius also assigned those pesky "movement archtypes" or whatever to mechs, meaning assaults automatically are more stodgy then heavy mechs. So even if you used the 5 tons on an Awesome 9M to put a 325 in to match a BK speed, you now have that to contend with too.

Now if you took the Awesome, and just gave up the speed contest and decided "well it has 80 tonner armor!" well, you would be right. But then, look at the firepower in question(laser boats) and ask yourself- "does that actually really matter?" The answer of course is no, a few armor points are not going to save you from a 50 point pinpoint alpha lol. That is a different issue really, the idea any mech basically is reduced down to a couple trigger pulls worth of hitpoints- but it does play into this comparison as one of the albeit small advantages in armor the Awesome has is mostly irrelevant.


In the end of course, the pilot will make more difference then the mech, but we all know that. Given an equal pilot, IMO you would be hard pressed to find any 80 ton mech flat superior to a 75 ton one, given the mechs are built to their strengths and not forced into cookie cutter loadouts(no laser boat Orion for instance, gotta build it to it's strengths). Sure, there is room for argument on which is better etc, but I can;t personally think of any 80 ton mech that is just clear cut order of magnitude better then a 75 tonner, as a general rule.

[Ted Wayz]

Prosperity Park, on 02 May 2016 - 11:57 AM, said:

Does it all come down to Narrow vs. Fat?

The Awesome is just big boned.

It is all about the quirks.

[Lightfoot]

The Awesome has a gigantic center torso compared to the Atlas even after they reduced it. You would think it would be the other way around since the Atlas is bigger, but this is why the Awesome is not so awesome.

[LowSubmarino]

In organized/competitive teams - or simply among more experienced and skilled players - you will have a lot of specialized mechs and builds. And ppl that know how to use them.
A lot of terrain in mwo allows ridge snipers or mobile skirmishers that will (because of mech, hardpoints, loadout, no-facetime weapons and loadout) outclass any mech that has to expose half of its broad chest or half of its huge torso to deliver its payload.

In lower skill run and shoot scenarios this doesnt matter.

Face some real competition and a mech like the Awesome is a death sentence.

No quirks could ever compensate for it.

Give it X 10000 Armor and see it die vs a mech that can take advantage of all the above mentioned advantages. It might take a while. But its just too imbalanced to be a real competition.

Many other mechs suffer from this or can in turn take advantage of this.

Terrain is everything. But the slower the mech the less impact it has in terms of forcing your enemy to engage where you want.

A slow assault like the awesome, that has to expose that much mech to shoot, that isnt mobile and will thus - by default - be dealing with ginormous amounts of face time is handicapped to a point where it simply cant compete on higher levels.

In more realistic simulations pilots or groups would plan carefully which mech to deploy where and in which terrain. As this choice is understandably mostly restricted in mwo you wont ever have anything that even comes close to balance between mechs and loadouts.

No face time, mobile, high hardpoints alpha strikers - basically at all ranges - are the true Tier 1 mechs in this game if two well organized and skilled teams meet.

But that isnt a factor in quickplay games. Not even in a lot of unit vs unit fights. Its more prevalent in those contexts though. And immediatly has a much bigger impact.

When the best teams meet in the championship you will see this.