521 replies to this topic

[Johnny Z]

adamts01, on 10 August 2016 - 10:15 PM, said:

Not implementing any bit of info warfare after PTS was a serious let down, the much hyped CW3 left me with zero hope for PGI, and the light nerf was the last straw that made me leave. There needs to be a groundbreaking, fundamental re-working of the game to get me back, which won't happen. It wouldn't surprise me one bit if the Cheetah gets nerfed. I dropped in probably 500 matches in lights since re-scale just to give them a real try, and nope, my favorite weight isn't even close to viable in any scenario outside of quickplay against scrubs. Planetside 2 from now on.

Ok well get this. If the peeps making this game are smart, what they will do is have a bunch of huge changes and additions all together so when they drop the trolls wont know what to spam complaints about first.

I say trolls because regular players are happy about new content and trolls try and ruin that.

Don't count on this but its entirely possible. I guess time will tell by the end of the year. I was wrong about this last year though...

On the bright side there are content and feature additions being added. Really slowly.

Edited by Johnny Z, 10 August 2016 - 11:32 PM.

[dervishx5]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 10 August 2016 - 10:55 PM, said:

I'm aware, just saying that at the particular time, it showed the potential of each mech pretty well.


Ummm, wtf are you talking about, that is EXACTLY the point of several lights in TT, even some mediums are good at it (Phantom C I'm looking at you). Hell, in the recent Battletech (the game) tech demo they showed off a Commando doing exactly that, something it was meant to do. Lights are not meant as scouts and anti-infantry only, they are also able to abuse initiative with their speed and touch assaults in their naughty bits.

Yeah... he's mostly right Quick. There's very few light mechs designed in the BT universe to take on heavier mechs. When they actually did they were often forced to.

But Battletech has different scales of combat where you'd often see groups of lights and mediums only facing each other. In MWO everybody is thrown into the mix.

However, it's not like they're going to throw what made lights really useful in Battletech into the game any time soon. So really the only role lights can play in this game are the ones most aren't designed for (which again is fighting with heavies and assaults).

Edited by dervishx5, 10 August 2016 - 11:31 PM.

[Y E O N N E]

Drunken Skull, on 10 August 2016 - 11:12 PM, said:

It's only a valid tactic against someone who is either clueless or already strung out so badly that they can't counter it. Regardless it isn't EXACTLY what they're meant to do, most of them are equipped to deal with anything from infantry to other light mechs. Using them like this is a one-trick pony that's extremely skittish and hard to ride(I don't use lights as it is because I cant be a$$ed with the effort, too much of a chore to be fun). It's also just completely demoralizing to the victim to boot, and my aim in playing is not to ruin the other persons day. TBH I find the use of light mechs in this way to be completely trollish and I won't play an active role in it.

I'm not talking about Hairbraine's new turn-based Btech here, and I think you might be on the wrong forum if you want to continue that line of discussion.

Following your logic from earlier posts, the entire point of heavier 'Mechs is to ruin the day of everybody driving 'Mechs of a weight below theirs.

Besides, bigs don't actually have problems with Lights for the most part. Only the bads do. Bigs and bads are not mutually inclusive.

[dervishx5]

Yeonne Greene, on 10 August 2016 - 11:30 PM, said:

Following your logic from earlier posts, the entire point of heavier 'Mechs is to ruin the day of everybody driving 'Mechs of a weight below theirs.

Besides, bigs don't actually have problems with Lights for the most part. Only the bads do. Bigs and bads are not mutually inclusive.

Yeah, I've often felt this is how my heavy or assault mech feels when a light comes to bother it:

[Moldur]

Deathlike, on 10 August 2016 - 09:57 PM, said:

It's bad when it is consistently the least queued up class, let alone just gathering stats for it would bear that out anyways.

If it was "fine" as people had claimed, there shouldn't need be an event to prove otherwise.

This is not a direct counter to what you say, but I would like to posit a thought of mine: Lights are not piloted as much because MWO lacks the situational variety to make use of what lights have to offer. Speed boats are great, but they are not of much use in a swimming pool. The problem here lies far beyond the faults of the speed boat or light mechs.

All the weight classes and all the chassis are currently bottlenecked into being balanced around a 12v12 deathmatch. Some mechs are better than others in this specific scenario. Thus, they are the best mechs in the game, because the only thing that exists so far in MWO is the previously stated scenario.





What is sad, downright sad, is that it is hard to even imagine that MWO could ever be anything more than what it is now. We all argue and discuss at length the best way to play in the kitty pool while barely being able to imagine the ocean.

Edited by Moldur, 10 August 2016 - 11:37 PM.

[Surn]

arctic Cheater is the name for a reason... stop whining to keep your broken mech and play fair.

[PhoenixFire55]

Yes yes, Russ still can't hit lights with anything even when they are standing still lights are still OP, need moar nerf.

[VorpalAnvil]

Surn, on 11 August 2016 - 12:25 AM, said:

Hurr durr peepl wooo yuse mex i hate R cheetrs

[RestosIII]

Surn, on 11 August 2016 - 12:25 AM, said:

arctic Cheater is the name for a reason... stop whining to keep your broken mech and play fair.

Edited by RestosIII, 11 August 2016 - 12:59 AM.

[Kotzi]

Ye, eight AC20 shots and the cheetah still lived. For sure you hit all of them. And of course there is only one explanation, IMBANESS.

[Yellonet]

The little bugger deserves every nerf it gets. It's gotten a little better, but it's still way too tanky for 30 tons, they can consistently survive facetanking much bigger mechs and they are often alive on the low 20%, feels like they only have one single hitbox sometimes. Pretty much the light I see most of nowadays and the only light that get 5-6 kills on a semi-regular basis.

[RestosIII]

Kotzi, on 11 August 2016 - 01:08 AM, said:

Ye, eight AC20 shots and the cheetah still lived. For sure you hit all of them. And of course there is only one explanation, IMBANESS.

"I hit it with all 8 AC 20 shots, while we were both mid-air, and then I punched {Godwin's Law} in the face, before every girl I knew said they wanted to have my babies."

That's all I can think of when people claim really accurate fire without video proof. It makes conversations more fun.

P.S I didn't know about that forum censor but I'm sticking with it anyways.

Edited by RestosIII, 11 August 2016 - 01:16 AM.

[adamts01]

DAYLEET, on 10 August 2016 - 10:27 PM, said:

I dont see the point, lights arent brawlers.This isnt a dueling game either.

Lights definitely aren't snipers, they lose a single trade to even a medium and they're gimped or dead. Don't even get me started on standing in squares for fun. They can be fast harassers, but mediums can be fast killers. It's not a dueling game..... Ok, so lights should team up on their target? Guess what, any other mech can team up and do it better. Increasing speed reaches a point where it stops being beneficial, and armor/guns are much more important. Assaults are very easy to hit, heavies and mediums are easy enough, and now that lights are just as easy to hit as mediums, there's no reason not to take a medium.

DAYLEET, on 10 August 2016 - 10:27 PM, said:

btw i strongly disagree with that.

Regarding fighting being the only option: Sure we all have stories of the handful of times scouting really paid off, or being a dedicated spotter, but for the other 98% of matches, it's all about sending pain downrange. In case you're going there, I don't recognize standing in stupid little squares a real mode.

Johnny Z, on 10 August 2016 - 11:28 PM, said:

Ok well get this. If the peeps making this game are smart, what they will do is have a bunch of huge changes and additions all together so when they drop the trolls wont know what to spam complaints about first.

I say trolls because regular players are happy about new content and trolls try and ruin that.

Don't count on this but its entirely possible. I guess time will tell by the end of the year. I was wrong about this last year though...

On the bright side there are content and feature additions being added. Really slowly.

I think a lot of the new content is great, I really do, but it's all fluff. Fluff only keeps people sticking around so long, eventually they need to give is a real CW, which was the cornerstone of their pitch since the beginning. 5 years later and it plays no better than it did in Beta.... Come on PGI.... I've hit my limit with them.

[chucklesMuch]

Lights and nerf do not currently belong in the same sentence... Cheetah may be better than other lights... But it's certainly isn't OP.

Yellonet, on 11 August 2016 - 01:13 AM, said:

The little bugger deserves every nerf it gets. It's gotten a little better, but it's still way too tanky for 30 tons, they can consistently survive facetanking much bigger mechs and they are often alive on the low 20%, feels like they only have one single hitbox sometimes. Pretty much the light I see most of nowadays and the only light that get 5-6 kills on a semi-regular basis.

So it would be better if there were no lights then?

[PJohann]

Nice thread. Full of "lights are weak hurr durr ACH is not op at all"
Good friend of mine, long time fan of BT universe brought me here couple years ago, currently spending his time playing tabletop. And just couple days ago we played in group queue and discussed various things about game including light mechs. He's avoiding playing ACH because "its overpowered ******** that should not exist". When I started to argue, that lights are squishy, he just grabbed trial cheetah and said "now look at me". Ended with over 900 damage and winned round .__. In first match.Now I cant argue about this thing being broken.

[Sjorpha]

"King of the light mechs" is true.

Overpowered? Not even close.

There is not a single truly strong light anymore, sadly.

[mogs01gt]

Gas Guzzler, on 10 August 2016 - 02:46 PM, said:

Does anyone else feel this way? I just saw this tweeted to Russ... watch out for Arctic Cheetah nerfs coming up soon! I just thought it was a top light because it didn't get wrecked by the rescale like the rest. Any light pilots care to comment about the OPness of the Arctic Cheetah?

OP no, a bit too much dmg and sustain 1v1 vs heavier mechs, yes. ML's shouldnt do much to assault mechs but Im a bot of a lore buff.

[Kotzi]

PJohann, on 11 August 2016 - 05:22 AM, said:

Nice thread. Full of "lights are weak hurr durr ACH is not op at all"
Good friend of mine, long time fan of BT universe brought me here couple years ago, currently spending his time playing tabletop. And just couple days ago we played in group queue and discussed various things about game including light mechs. He's avoiding playing ACH because "its overpowered ******** that should not exist". When I started to argue, that lights are squishy, he just grabbed trial cheetah and said "now look at me". Ended with over 900 damage and winned round .__. In first match.Now I cant argue about this thing being broken.

Now if he could do that again and record it please. Sounds like no problem to him. Having a great game in a mech once and a while does not make that mech unbalanced. Sorry maybe i am biased but i dont crap my pants when i meet an enemy Cheetah. Maybe when he has company or i am cored but otherwise.

[Novakaine]

Gud, don't like em little back shooting..........

[Mawai]

Well ... here is my opinion

The Arctic Cheetah is an example of a balance issue. Is the Arctic Cheetah better than every other light mech? I'd say yes.

Anyone care to disagree?

Just look at the scores on the light leaderboard event. The Arctic Cheetah out scores EVERY other light by a significant amount. The average scores over the top 75 are 10% to 20% higher than the next best light mech and are 50% or more higher than the less competitive lights. The leaderboard event compared light mechs under comparable circumstances driven by pilots trying to get their light mech to perform at optimal levels. The numbers may not be comparable to other mech classes but they should certainly offer some insight into relative balance among lights.

On that basis, Arctic Cheetahs effectively have a built in quirk on the order of 10% to 50% over all other lights. Is that unbalanced ... in my opinion YES.

Is the Arctic Cheetah OP? Maybe since it is strictly better than every other light and is unbalanced ... does this make it OVER-powered ... depends on how you define OVER. Is the Arctic Cheetah an instant win button? Obviously not. You can kill Arctic Cheetah's just like every other mech.

In order to get BALANCE in a game ... you have to toss away your bias. A lot of folks say "Arctic Cheetah is fine ... doesn't need a nerf" ... mostly because they like playing it the way it is ... at least in part BECAUSE it is the best light mech out there. If you play ANY mech because you think/feel it is the BEST then you are implicitly saying it is unbalanced since it is better than any other.

I have my favourite mechs that I do well in, that cater to my preferred playstyles, that I enjoy playing ... CPLT-J, JM6-S, JR7-D, HBK-4G, various MAD ... but they are middle of the pack in terms of overall performance and they take some effort and work to get good results. On the other hand, a while ago I bought Stormcrows for cbills ... and that is a GREAT mech. Lots of loadouts, fast (very fast for a medium), great firepower, good hit boxes ... I can still have bad games in it ... but it is a bit easier to get decent results than my other mechs. Arctic Cheetah, Stormcrow, Timberwolf, Kodiak, Dire Wolf can all be extremely effective ... they are probably at the top of their respective mech classes still. The advantage is probably on the order of 10% to 50% (top to bottom of mechs in the weight class) ... but they are still not BALANCED against the other choices,.

The question is how far out of balance can a mech get before it is OP? Most of those I mentioned aren't really OP anymore .. but they are still unbalanced. What is an acceptable range for mech capability within a weight class? There will always be a BEST and a WORST in any category ... the balance question to PGI is really how BIG that difference should be AND what sorts of changes would be acceptable to close that gap?

----------

tl;dr ... Arctic Cheetah is still the best light mech ... PGI needs to come up with a balance strategy that can address clan vs IS balance, tonnage balance and weight class balance ... quirks of one sort or another can probably be used but PGI needs a unified design strategy to do so. When that happens, the relative ranking of all mechs will change.