96 replies to this topic

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Wintersdark, on 27 June 2016 - 07:39 AM, said:

I don't know what people expected. That was it, the only two possibilities - volumetric, or random and arbitrary.

No, there were technically 3, you forgot surface area (which can be calculated if volume can), which would've been better albeit still subject to Paul's interference.

[DAYLEET]

All these full silhouette on top of other full silhouette are as good as tarot reading. If we can extract the 3d model, there must be a software that calculate the volume.


Personalty i was hoping the rescale was going to be a balancing act. Like they did with latest mech that had better hitbox but instead we got volumetric and thickness/flatness on a wide surface look like nothing but really increase volume fast.

Edited by DAYLEET, 27 June 2016 - 08:08 AM.

[Ultimax]

Wintersdark, on 27 June 2016 - 07:39 AM, said:

Whatever. It doesn't matter now. We didn't get purely volumetric scaling, we got scaling by Paul, which was the only possible alternative.

I don't know what people expected. That was it, the only two possibilities - volumetric, or random and arbitrary. But what we have is all we'll ever have, so everything else is just random forum babbling. I'm not interested in arguing about it now.

But, at least we're no worse off than we were before, and things have mixed up a bit, and I always enjoy that. Makes my 120 some mechs more entertaining.

It's not like most of the changes have any noticeable game impact anyways.

I expected them to go SMALLER with the rescale across the board.

You can be a non-thinking slave bowing to the gospel of "volumetric scaling" and still end up with "accurate" volumes by making all mechs smaller.


This is a critical element, because it lets you balance by skill (keep this point in mind, its important).

Making most mechs larger, means more players can hit targets and components more easily.

This..is really bad for balance.


Take a look at the past two years of quirks, there is only so much structure and armor and agility you can realisitcally give to a mech to make up for POOR GEOMETRY and BAD PROFILES before it either just becomes ridiculous or breaks other systems.

What else can it break? Well, weapon balance for one.

If you need to start quirking the hell out of mechs to compensate for them just absorbing all damage instead of being able to evade some, now you need to start re-balancing weapons so that a Gauss round intended to have a big impact at 15 damage (which is actually moderate damage in this game on it's own already) - suddenly is no longer as valuable as it was.

Ammo per ton becomes an issue, damage per heat becomes an issue - all of these other problems form because the game starts to shift from FPS aiming based mechanics to more MMO like "hit the big sack of HP boss" mechanics.

What I expected was for rational, reasonable people to realize in the moment they said "Oh, wow, the Awesome is right on the money volume wise" that something was tragically wrong with the direction they were headed.

When the mechs people have complained about for years as being "too large" (i.e. too easy to hit, or too easy to receive damage) like the Awesome, the Griffins, end up "right on the money" or actually need to increase in size - there is a flaw in the plan.



So...why make mechs bigger & easier to hit?

Why heap on more structure quirks to compensate? (Which they didn't do by the way, they nerfed GRHs and BKs both offense and structure)

Why limit alpha damage?


Why?

Well, it goes back to requiring higher skill to hit smaller targets and require less skill to hit larger ones with more hit points (you just have to hit them more, but it's now eaiser to do).


Who does this benefit? It's certainly not aimed at upper tier players/teams, that's for sure.

Edited by Ultimax, 27 June 2016 - 08:11 AM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

DAYLEET, on 27 June 2016 - 07:57 AM, said:

All these full silhouette on top of other full silhouette are as good as tarot reading. If we can extract the 3d model, there must be a software that calculate the volume.

You have to be able to combine parts into one giant polygon, or at the very least, combine all the small meshes for each larger subdivision into one. There is more work than simply extracting the model to test for volume/SA. It can be done, just requires the right plugins or program (I believe someone did it with ZBrush before?).

[Sigilum Sanctum]

Ultimax, on 27 June 2016 - 07:59 AM, said:

I expected them to go SMALLER with the rescale across the board.

You can be a non-thinking slave bowing to the gospel of "volumetric scaling" and still end up with "accurate" volumes by making all mechs smaller.


This is a critical element, because it lets you balance by skill (keep this point in mind, its important).

Making most mechs larger, means more players can hit targets and components more easily.

This..is really bad for balance.


Take a look at the past two years of quirks, there is only so much structure and armor and agility you can realisitcally give to a mech to make up for POOR GEOMETRY and BAD PROFILES before it either just becomes ridiculous or breaks other systems.

What else can it break? Well, weapon balance for one.

If you need to start quirking the hell out of mechs to compensate for them just absorbing all damage instead of being able to evade some, now you need to start re-balancing weapons so that a Gauss round intended to have a big impact at 15 damage (which is actually moderate damage in this game on it's own already) - suddenly is no longer as valuable as it was.

Ammo per ton becomes an issue, damage per heat becomes an issue - all of these other problems form because the game starts to shift from FPS aiming based mechanics to more MMO like "hit the big sack of HP boss" mechanics.

What I expected was for rational, reasonable people to realize in the moment they said "Oh, wow, the Awesome is right on the money volume wise" that something was tragically wrong with the direction they were headed.

When the mechs people have complained about for years as being "too large" (i.e. too easy to hit, or too easy to receive damage) like the Awesome, the Griffins, end up "right on the money" or actually need to increase in size - there is a flaw in the plan.



So...why make mechs bigger & easier to hit?

Why heap on more structure quirks to compensate? (Which they didn't do by the way, they nerfed GRHs and BKs both offense and structure)

Why limit alpha damage?


Why?

Well, it goes back to requiring higher skill to hit smaller targets and require less skill to hit larger ones with more hit points (you just have to hit them more, but it's now eaiser to do).


Who does this benefit? It's certainly not aimed and upper tier players/teams, that's for sure.

Because the people who play this game don't want an engaging skill based shooter. They just want a point and click adventure.

Where's Koniving?

[DAYLEET]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 27 June 2016 - 08:05 AM, said:

You have to be able to combine parts into one giant polygon, or at the very least, combine all the small meshes for each larger subdivision into one.

If all parts are separate, just add then separately. LA is xx + RA is xx + LT is xx etc add them all up.

[Rampancy]

Alistair Winter, on 27 June 2016 - 01:19 AM, said:

Oh man, I missed that the first time I saw it. I guess I had a sneaking suspicion that they'd made some exceptions, because the scaling doesn't seem consistent.

"Balance reasons" is a terrible basis for rescaling in a game where mechs go from obscurity to invincibility to mediocrity in a matter of months, depending on external factors (e.g. weapon balancing, infotech, power draw).

Volumetric scaling is the only thing that makes sense, in my opinion. Everything else is arbitrary and prone to terrible decisions.


Thanks! The difference between Locust, Mist Lynx and Spider isn't as bad as I had thought.

Thunderbolt vs Black Knight though... ffs.

Feet are sticking out on the black knight. Tbolt is thicker in the torso, but the black knight feet make it not look that way from the top-down.

[Mcgral18]

DAYLEET, on 27 June 2016 - 08:16 AM, said:

If all parts are separate, just add then separately. LA is xx + RA is xx + LT is xx etc add them all up.

Arms are iffy, but worse are the torsi, not always full but just front and back shell
I can try to tear one apart tonight to show you

Edited by Mcgral18, 27 June 2016 - 08:22 AM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

DAYLEET, on 27 June 2016 - 08:16 AM, said:

If all parts are separate, just add then separately. LA is xx + RA is xx + LT is xx etc add them all up.

Again, it's more complicated than that because of the fact that many pieces are meshes rather than a solid object, think a bunch of sheets the are allowed to magically intersect each other.

For example, a leg is comprised of the upper leg, lower leg, ankle, toes, maybe some special geometry. Each of those sub-components may be comprised of 5 or so meshes with some being solid meshes or a "sheet" mesh. As McGral said, the torsos often have the most of these.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 27 June 2016 - 08:32 AM.

[DAYLEET]

Mcgral18, on 27 June 2016 - 08:22 AM, said:

Arms are iffy, but worse are the torsi, not always full but just front and back shell
I can try to tear one apart tonight to show you

If you can find easier mech to do it sure but dont go out of your way for me, i dont think people will like the results. Volume is fair mathematically, it cares not for balance and thats not what people want hear.

Also Thanks for the work youve already done. But reading the replies, i think it's misleading or it assume people can solve volumetric problems with their eyeball without being biased with balance and dear chassis.

[Major Tomm]

barf... what kind of re-scale was this? Looks more like a beauty contest.

The scale that counts is the torso size of course.

Edited by Major Tomm, 27 June 2016 - 12:37 PM.

[cazidin]

I have a few more.

Timber Wolf vs Marauder.

Mauler vs Kodiak.

Phoenix Hawk vs Thunderbolt.

Batman vs Superman.

[Mechwarrior1441491]

They lured people into this recent change by dangling the Nova, Catapult, Locust as examples of what was coming. Bait and switch. There are a half dozen good changes.

Panther is the most dead of them all.

[ScarecrowES]

Mechwarrior1441491, on 27 June 2016 - 01:55 PM, said:

They lured people into this recent change by dangling the Nova, Catapult, Locust as examples of what was coming. Bait and switch. There are a half dozen good changes.

Panther is the most dead of them all.

*shrug* Normalization means there will be winners and losers. Luckily, there aren't many real losers here. Most mechs that went up did so by so little that the effect will be negligible. As much as people lament the Jenner's new size, even this topic shows it really didn't go up by much. And it's certainly no bigger than the Raven has always been.

We always knew humanoid mechs were going to have a larger frontal profile, as you'd expect them to. Now, many people have argued with me that humanoid mechs are at an advantage because the can spread damage better during torso twisting... I'm not totally convinced there, but they DO have the advantage that they can shield their torsos with their arms - something non-humanoids can't really do.

So humanoids get a larger frontal profile, but better damage mitigation. Non-humanoids have a smaller frontal profile, but are fat from the side and can't shield. Theoretically, there should be some level of balance between humanoids and nons now. I'm interested to see if this plays out in-game now.

[AssaultPig]

volume is imo a silly way to scale mechs anyway; volume is pretty much irrelevant to gameplay, while other factors (height, width, etc) are very relevant.

but, /shrug, I am enjoying my tiny catapult

Edited by AssaultPig, 27 June 2016 - 03:24 PM.

[Major Tomm]

I was in my Crab earlier and I looked to my right at a Catapult and I was looking down at it. Not saying increase the Catapult or reduce the Crab, but the re-scale is uneven and I don't see the reasoning for some of the increases in size. And some of it seems impossible.

[Narcissistic Martyr]

ScarecrowES, on 27 June 2016 - 02:42 PM, said:

*shrug* Normalization means there will be winners and losers. Luckily, there aren't many real losers here. Most mechs that went up did so by so little that the effect will be negligible. As much as people lament the Jenner's new size, even this topic shows it really didn't go up by much. And it's certainly no bigger than the Raven has always been.

Yes but the Raven has 5 hitboxes that matter and get intentionally shot. The Jenner has 3 being as they're basically 100% CT. Ah well, i just stripped a ton of armor of the side torsos and added more JJ or ammo.

Edited by Narcissistic Martyr, 28 June 2016 - 09:31 AM.

[ScarecrowES]

Narcissistic Martyr, on 28 June 2016 - 09:30 AM, said:

Yes but the Raven has 5 hitboxes that matter and get intentionally shot. The Jenner has 3 being as they're basically 100% CT. Ah well, i just stripped a ton of armor of the side torsos and added more JJ or ammo.

Yup... Jenner has always been a walking CT. Funny enough, they still work fine. Ive been taking mine out and doing as well as usual. Thinking about picking up the IICs finally.

[Narcissistic Martyr]

ScarecrowES, on 28 June 2016 - 10:42 AM, said:

Yup... Jenner has always been a walking CT. Funny enough, they still work fine. Ive been taking mine out and doing as well as usual. Thinking about picking up the IICs finally.

Well you couldn't get seen before or you'd splat and that's still the case so yeah checks out IMO.

[Mcgral18]

I'll get some more done Friday

I picked a bad time to start doing these