21 replies to this topic

[Kin3ticX]

First of all, I think that PTS1 was a very well made foundation for the system but that doesn't mean I think it should ultimately go live. PTS2 looked pretty worrisome to me.

Here are my arguments:

• Its too radical of a system to forcibly strap to MechWarrior and non 1 to 1 energy draw will be a mess for players to understand.

• PTS 1 made a good start to demo the feature but PTS 2 shows that there is a TON of number fudging needed to reach the goal PGI is aiming here. Its a very complex problem and Power Draw may be a false cure-all here.

• Power draw proponents that hope the metagamers go home crying underestimate the fun factor of alpha strikes. This game is funner and rewarding when you are efficiently coring out a mech and MUCH less fun sandblasting each other to 0% health. Forcing people to chip chip away at each other will damage the product.

• Power draw for ammo based weapons is very anti intuitive and this is a huge blemish for power draw to overcome.

• The heat bar is essentially a power bar in reverse. Power draw is a power bar within a power bar and this throws off some major bad idea alarms imo.

• The game is filled with weapons and mechs that follow very close to lore and this system is as non-lore as it gets. The Gauss Rifle for example has always been 1 heat and PGI has adjusted it almost every which way(charge up, cooldown, crit health, crit damage). PTS2 does this very thing by making two Gauss Rifles generate heat. Why wont PGI just make the Gauss Rifle generate more then 1 heat? Why would power draw be preferential over just drifting a little more from lore globally? Are people willing to have the game be merely lore on its face but then have an even more complicated backend system to counter it?

Edited by Kin3ticX, 27 August 2016 - 10:04 AM.

[Don Ino]

Kin3ticX for Executive Space Coordinator 3054

[Kael Posavatz]

[RP on]
Democracy is so very un-clan like. Instead I offer my word that I will not launch a Trial of Refusal against him taking the post.
[/RP Off]

Kin3ticX managed to hit most of the high points.

Here is another one. Ghost Heat is something that new players can 'manage' in the MechLab. Energy Draw moves that function into the cockpit in the middle of gameplay where it become just one more distraction that they really don't need.

Edited by Kael Posavatz, 27 August 2016 - 05:28 PM.

[Cold Darkness]

if efficiently alphastrike-coring your opponents is so much more fun, why dont we remove ghost heat and powerdraw and call it day? you know, just so i can efficiently core anything but 85+ton mechs in a single alphastrike.

OH RIGHT, BECAUSE IT WOULDNT EVEN BE A ******* MECHWARRIOR GAME ANYMORE

seriously, while there are pros and conts to every system one could possibly come up with, some people should try to understand that they might just not play the right game for them. you are propably one of those people, because you obviously look to a much more straight forward arena shooter mechanic.

why do i even say such things? because the very essence of mechwarriors appeal is sandpapering big ******* mechs. thats why they have components.

[DarthPeanut]

Agree with most of this!

I really dont mind the idea of a visual queue that more or less illustrates what is now ghost heat. Once you are past that part of it I pretty much disagree with the implementation of energy draw. Its a back end system to counter what basically is a lore inspired value system you see up front in game. It just makes something convoluted for the sake of maintaining appearances.

PTS 2 just flat out ignored the majority of the feedback I read and doubled down on the same approach with more nerfs/ penalties. It 100% looks like someone using spread sheet value to make changes that they think will further counter the loopholes in a broken energy draw system. The problem with that is how the game actually PLAYS! While you still are not fixing the ability to exploit certain builds in energy draw you literally are KILLING the flavor of this game and reducing the diversity (ironically in a supposed effort to create it).

Right now I dare say almost all weapons systems are viable and pretty well balanced. Throwing a whole new set of mechanics in and the old out to address a few outlying offender builds or new mech power creep is pretty insane imo. It is very well said in this reddit thread by the OP and Celyth among others. https://www.reddit.c...his_new_system/

The energy draw in PTS 2 will make for slow stale game play which will devolve into a mix of the same srms lights/ mediums and clan erll boats camping at range to play light saber battle for 15 minutes. Ballistics nerfs in the PTS 2 are insane and so heavy handed it is not even funny, among other things.

There is so much to say about this PTS and system but I honestly get frustrated cause I feel like it is a wasted effort when you see PTS 2 ignore what I think was a large majority of feedback.

It is like PGI makes an effort to avoid agreeing with the player base out of spite until it gets to extremes. Like they actively search for alternative ways to do what is suggested but by entirely different means... so it appears "PGI" inspiration.

I actually really like this game and it is a shame to see such a divide in the community from the devs. It really seems like some very influential devs do not enjoy their own game enough to want to play. It seems like the motivation/ passion for what they are doing is gone and they are almost a little bitter or passive aggressive toward the population. So now its just a job of going through the motions and repeating a cycle of throwing things at the wall to see what sticks or is a compromised middle ground. IMO players continue playing in spite of this because they primarily love the big stompy mechs, the art, mech design, the customization potential, etc... it is not so much the game play filled with convoluted mechanics at this point.

ETA: Added some wording to clarify slightly.

Edited by DarthPeanut, 27 August 2016 - 11:08 AM.

[kapusta11]

Neither iteration of ED is good. ED nerfed a freaking Ice Ferret.

[fbj]

Cold Darkness, on 27 August 2016 - 10:48 AM, said:

if efficiently alphastrike-coring your opponents is so much more fun, why dont we remove ghost heat and powerdraw and call it day? you know, just so i can efficiently core anything but 85+ton mechs in a single alphastrike.

OH RIGHT, BECAUSE IT WOULDNT EVEN BE A ******* MECHWARRIOR GAME ANYMORE

seriously, while there are pros and conts to every system one could possibly come up with, some people should try to understand that they might just not play the right game for them. you are propably one of those people, because you obviously look to a much more straight forward arena shooter mechanic.

why do i even say such things? because the very essence of mechwarriors appeal is sandpapering big ******* mechs. thats why they have components.

That is a perfect point. While we are at as well. We should return the armor values to what the Table Top uses.

Edited by fbj, 27 August 2016 - 10:57 AM.

[Wintersdark]

I love ED. I'm not going to go into why and whatnot again or arguing anything; just say'n - I absolutely love it to bits, that it makes combats into longer slugging matches instead of just quick "pop - dead - pop - dead" back and forth. Love it.

ED has all my <3's.

[Kin3ticX]

Cold Darkness, on 27 August 2016 - 10:48 AM, said:

if efficiently alphastrike-coring your opponents is so much more fun, why dont we remove ghost heat and powerdraw and call it day? you know, just so i can efficiently core anything but 85+ton mechs in a single alphastrike.

I am for heatscaling/ghost heat as before that the meta was 4xPPC everything and 6xPPC even made a 2-off trick derp build. However, PGI has been not so great at making sure heatscaling controlled alphastrikes post-clan launch. Thats what started up a long lasting 50-80 alpha Vomit & Gauss+Vomit meta despite heat scaling being a thing. Maybe heatscaling isnt up to the challenge anymore but I dont think power draw is the goto feature. Power creep can screw up any game and can lead to crazy features to fix said creep.

[Monkey Lover]

Of course pt1 was 'OK' it basically removed ghost heat and gave long range pin point alpha shots of 80 dmg with a extra 25 splash dmg. Rofl

It wasn't until pt2 when they really started to nerf the alpha.

Everyone wants balance and everyone doesn't want ttk to be 1/second. But very few are willing to balance by nerfing and very few are willing to give up crazy alphas lol.

Edited by Monkey Lover, 27 August 2016 - 11:13 AM.

[DarthPeanut]

Funny, I have had plenty of long slugfest matches as it is. Although I could quickly turn this into a conversation about MM and the saturation of the participation system (tiers) as much as anything when people want to talk about stomps but I dont want to distract from the topic.

So what some are basically saying is that they like that ED does not punish people nearly as much for mistakes, mistakes which now are quickly punished in a live server (like face tanking dmg). I make them all the time and yep I realize I AM responsible for getting crushed when I do make them.

Also you are only playing 4v4 in PTS... in a 12v12 it will change and be much different.

Edited by DarthPeanut, 27 August 2016 - 11:22 AM.

[Tarl Cabot]

Know what the scary parts of many of these threads and posts are, people preferring Ghost Heat 1.0... of course most of that is primarily due to the non-linked weapon synergy currently on Live servers, but still......

Edited by Tarl Cabot, 27 August 2016 - 12:05 PM.

[Kael Posavatz]

Tarl Cabot, on 27 August 2016 - 12:05 PM, said:

Know what the scary parts of many of these threads and posts are, people preferring Ghost Heat 1.0...

No, the scary thing is that because we are referring to Energy Draw as 'Ghost Heat 2.0' PGI will decide that means it is obviously and clearly superior to '1.0' and decides to implement without addressing problems or issues.

[Kin3ticX]

Tarl Cabot, on 27 August 2016 - 12:05 PM, said:

Know what the scary parts of many of these threads and posts are, people preferring Ghost Heat 1.0... of course most of that is primarily due to the non-linked weapon synergy currently on Live servers, but still......

When clans were new someone tweeted to Russ why ERML and ML were both 6x limit. The answer was something like "because I want 6-6 parity" or something like that. It was a disappointing answer to be sure. Remember, for months of Clan launch, ERMLs were essentially Large Lasers that weighed 1 ton yet clans could fire 6 still. Apply PGI Logic to that not even taking weapon links into account. With huge flaws like that there is no surprise heat scale has flaws other places.

Edited by Kin3ticX, 27 August 2016 - 12:35 PM.

[Cy Mitchell]

Kin3ticX, on 27 August 2016 - 10:02 AM, said:

First of all, I think that PTS1 was a very well made foundation for the system but that doesn't mean I think it should ultimately go live.

PTS1 was very basic but it did nothing to limit the repeatable Alpha which was its sole purpose. PTS2 does not eliminate Alphas but it does eliminate multiple high powered Alphas.

Here are my arguments:

• Its too radical of a system to forcibly strap to MechWarrior and non 1 to 1 energy draw will be a mess for players to understand.

Ghost Heat is an even more obscure system. A new player has to learn how to circumvent all the controls GH was created to put in place in order to be competitive.

• PTS 1 made a good start to demo the feature but PTS 2 shows that there is a TON of number fudging needed to reach the goal PGI is aiming here. Its a very complex problem and Power Draw may be a false cure-all here.

PTS one was a starting point but it did not accomplish its goal. Yes, numbers had to be adjusted. The final numbers would be shown in the MechLab when equipping weapons. It is not simple but it is not a GHOST either.

• Power draw proponents that hope the metagamers go home crying underestimate the fun factor of alpha strikes. This game is funner and rewarding when you are efficiently coring out a mech and MUCH less fun sandblasting each other to 0% health. Forcing people to chip chip away at each other will damage the product.

Top tier players will always adapt to the game and still be top tier players. No one wants skilled gamers to leave. But the present Alpha- Alpha- Alpha meta has driven Mechwarrior players away from the game in disgust. The abuse of the Alpha has damaged the game in many peoples opinion.

• Power draw for ammo based weapons is very anti intuitive and this is a huge blemish for power draw to overcome.

Power draw should have an effect on ballistic and missile based systems to. It takes power to move ammo around the Mech using one or more ammo reload systems. If the lore thing bothers you then think of it that way.

• The heat bar is essentially a power bar in reverse. Power draw is a power bar within a power bar and this throws off some major bad idea alarms imo.

It is not a perfect system but they had to come up with something to imrove the state of the game and this is it.

• The game is filled with weapons and mechs that follow very close to lore and this system is as non-lore as it gets. The Gauss Rifle for example has always been 1 heat and PGI has adjusted it almost every which way(charge up, cooldown, crit health, crit damage). PTS2 does this very thing by making two Gauss Rifles generate heat. Why wont PGI just make the Gauss Rifle generate more then 1 heat? Why would power draw be preferential over just drifting a little more from lore globally? Are people willing to have the game be merely lore on its face but then have an even more complicated backend system to counter it?

Even though the Gauss generates very little heat it did draw on an incredible amount of power to charge up the gun (thus the reason it could explode). Generating power in a BattleMech generated a lot of heat in the Mech. Thus it stands to reason that charging a Gauss or multiple Gauss should generate a high amount of heat. I do not see that as straying from lore.

I supplied some counter points just in the interest of a discussion. I do not see PTS2 as a perfect system. However, even though it is more complex than many would like it to be, it has to include elements to address all weapons systems and combinations of systems in order to close the loop holes that Ghost Heat allows. It is doing what it is supposed to do and limiting Alpha strikes. While some see that as a bad thing, many of us disagree and think it is not only a good thing but also a necessary thing to retain the core population of people who want to play a game that feels like a MechWarror game.

Alphas will not be gone but they will be less frequent. Skilled players will still prevail. The game will be at least as fun as it is now.

[Mark of Caine]

Mechwarrior Online started out quite well 3 years ago. TTK was generally up, and everyone was having fun. Then Alpha Strike Warrior Online permeated the meta (after Bunny Hopping Warrior Online), and now you get your Atlas cored in 2 seconds flat by some Dire Whale or Carebear. This energy draw system is coming along on the right track, BUT, PGI MUST put on their big boy pants and go several steps further to utterly KILL Alpha Strike Warrior Online, and bring back MWO to the levels of making it fun. As far as I'm concerned, they are not there yet, and they need to go even further. Alpha strikes should happen once or twice in a match, NOT once or twice every 10 seconds.

It really is that simple. Period.

[Mystere]

Convergence

[xe N on]

Kin3ticX, on 27 August 2016 - 10:02 AM, said:

• Its too radical of a system to forcibly strap to MechWarrior and non 1 to 1 energy draw will be a mess for players to understand.

This game needs radical changes otherwise it will be radically dead. In addition, everything what makes this game more complex is good. Handling complex thing is some sort of skill. If I want to play a flat out shooter, I go playing some other FPS products.

Quote

• Power draw proponents that hope the metagamers go home crying underestimate the fun factor of alpha strikes. This game is funner and rewarding when you are efficiently coring out a mech and MUCH less fun sandblasting each other to 0% health. Forcing people to chip chip away at each other will damage the product.

Are you for real? Fun factor of Alphastrike Warrior Online? Fun? Even Poptarting Online was more fun than this!

Quote

• The game is filled with weapons and mechs that follow very close to lore and this system is as non-lore as it gets. The Gauss Rifle for example has always been 1 heat and PGI has adjusted it almost every which way(charge up, cooldown, crit health, crit damage). PTS2 does this very thing by making two Gauss Rifles generate heat. Why wont PGI just make the Gauss Rifle generate more then 1 heat? Why would power draw be preferential over just drifting a little more from lore globally? Are people willing to have the game be merely lore on its face but then have an even more complicated backend system to counter it?

Mechwarrior titles never took fully over BT rules. Otherwise it would be much more costly to customize mechs. And you would roll some dice for calculating if you hit or not.

Edited by xe N on, 27 August 2016 - 01:08 PM.

[Mystere]

xe N on, on 27 August 2016 - 01:07 PM, said:

Mechwarrior titles never took fully over BT rules.

But they could certainly use some more.

xe N on, on 27 August 2016 - 01:07 PM, said:

And you would roll some dice for calculating if you hit or not.

That's definitely a problem if people simply take things completely literally instead of actually analyzing what was being abstracted.

The "This is not TT!" meme is really getting really old.

Edited by Mystere, 27 August 2016 - 01:15 PM.

[Sable]

People keep saying alpha striking is fun... except it's not fun for the other guy that gets one shot. If you want to one shot everyone go play CoD. it's really that simple.