135 replies to this topic

[Dimento Graven]

1453 R, on 24 January 2017 - 02:19 PM, said:

Dimento, you're being deliberately obtuse. Please read carefully. I'm making a point you are either deliberately missing in your JohnnyZ-like hatred of all things Clan, or your goat is so up you're not understanding what's being said.

You're conflating the cXL 'reward' in a risk/reward analysis for the two engine types with "EVERY ADVANTAGE OF THE ENTIRE CLAN TECH BASE".

That's not hot it works.

Except that is EXACTLY the EFFECT IN GAME, and that's what YOU are being deliberately obtuse in ignoring.

SO WHAT if the IS 'mech moves 20% faster in IS XL, the cumulative affect of all the OTHER Clan bene's is that the Clan 'mech is TYPICALLY sporting a LARGER, FARTHER REACHING alpha, allowing the Clan an EASIER TIME getting through that IS ST armor.

All that other stuff you said is ignoring the cumulative affect of 4 free tons of slotless CASE, the fact that most other weapons are smaller, and lighter, hit harder AND from a farther distance.

"Better speed" only addresses ONE FACTOR of survivability. No matter what, once the ST is gone, the IS player's game is over, but somehow, in your 'balance' factoring, that doesn't matter as much as making a Clan player move more slowly, giving them a bad gaming experience, and incredibly you justify this as "Oh the IS player knew what he was getting into when he equipped that XL..."

If the Turkayyid events taught us anything it was that even when significant numbers of IS 'mechs are running standard engines, the IS >>STILL<< had to, on average, do 20% MORE damage to the Clans to get a kill.

So simply adding speed on to an IS XL engine isn't the answer, more speed doesn't equal more damage.

So either, take away the death penalty from the IS, OR, something more drastic has to happen to a Clan 'mech.

[Duke Nedo]

Just came back from 4 straight wins and many kills... at least the poptarting 3D is back in town lol.

[Sjorpha]

Dimento Graven, on 24 January 2017 - 02:21 PM, said:

Fine, if you can define a "change" to the IS XL that garuntees the IS has a BETTER chance of blowing away the entire CT, or BOTH ST's of a Clan 'mech BEFORE the Clan 'mech can blow away a SINGLE IS ST, we can talk.

So far, I ain't seeing anything coming close to that...

We have discussed a number of suggestions in this thread, we both want them big enough to actually balance the performance gap between the engines. Can you for starters accept that? That we actually want that? You should know I'm not a clan apologist at least if you read the forums.

The suggestions we have discussed have been: Higher speed than cXL, Significant agility buffs, structure/armour buffs. I'm in favor of increasing the reward rather than reduce the risk, because I think that is more fun. So my favorite solution is making the IS XL a bit faster and have significant agility buffs, making IS mechs better at avoiding damage while clan mechs are better at tanking/surviving it. How big do these advantages need to be? It would have to be tested a bit but I'm sure it can be done.

Also as you say the "cumulative effect" of all clan advantages doesn't get balanced by this. No obviously not. Are you suggesting the IS XL alone should be buffed so much that it balances the entire tech imbalance for everything else too? Sorry, that's ridiculous.

You have to make some kind of distinction what you are talking about. We are talking about the engines here. Obviosly weapons need to be balanced versus weapons and so on, but the way you harp on about "ALL THE OTHER STUFF OMG!" makes it impossible to talk rationally about the engines.

Edited by Sjorpha, 24 January 2017 - 02:37 PM.

[1453 R]

Dimento Graven, on 24 January 2017 - 02:21 PM, said:

...
Fine, if you can define a "change" to the IS XL that garuntees the IS has a BETTER chance of blowing away the entire CT, or BOTH ST's of a Clan 'mech BEFORE the Clan 'mech can blow away a SINGLE IS ST, we can talk.

So far, I ain't seeing anything coming close to that...

Nobody should be looking for a "BETTER" chance. Yeebus, man.

The Sphere guy and the Clan guy should have equivalent chances of victory, if equal in tonnage and built for the same fight. That is what 'balance' means. The iXL does not need some sort of monster tweak that turns anything with one in it into Mechagodzilla. It needs something to pull its reward up commensurate with its risk.

The level of uptweak that requires is in part based on how much performance on the cXL decreases after a shoulder blowout. The harsher the penalty on the cXL, the weaker any prospective iXL buffs need to be to pull the two engines into rough parity, since the increased pre-blowout iXL performance is being offset by the non-death performance of the post-blowout cXL. Right now, the performance decrease is 40% reduction in heat sink efficiency and 20% reduced movement speed for Clan 'Mechs. That's a significant but not crippling penalty, which means the pre-blowout iXL requires a pretty nice performance package to bring it into line. ~5% speed and 20 extra points of mobility rating may well not be enough, though I would personally consider it a nice start point for (hopefully) incremental adjustment.

But asking for an uptweak that allows an iXL guy to blow through all three torso sections of a Clan machine before the Clan guy can get through one is both ridiculous and disingenuous, as those times are both drastically affected by pilot skill, 'Mech design/role, range, and all those other messy battlefield things. It's not something you can just code into the game, and also that would be far too much uptweak and you know it.

Dimento Graven, on 24 January 2017 - 02:31 PM, said:

...
So either, take away the death penalty from the IS, OR, something more drastic has to happen to a Clan 'mech.

Jeebus cod-whalloping sons of Wharvan...PLEASE PAY ATTENTION.

I'm not ignoring any of that, but this thread? This particular discussion? It is about ENGINES.. Not C.A.S.E.. Not Endo/Ferro. Not weapon balance. Not DHS. Engines. Engines, engines, engines, engines, ENGINES.

You do not fix C.A.S.E. by making cXL designs move like legged 'Mechs after shoulder blowout. That makes no damn sense. It has nothing to do with C.A.S.E.. You don't fix weapon balance by making cXL designs move like legged 'Mechs after shoulder blowout. That does literally nothing to redress any of the problems you have with Clan weaponry; all it does is make the Clan guy more irritable after he's already used his oh-so-superior pre-blowout armament to wreck your scheiss.

The thing that fixing engine discrepancies does is fix engine discrepancies. That's the single most major discrepancy to fix, so we're talking about fixing it. The rest can have its own thread. I've been over a dozen different points already. Can we talk about engines in the engines thread, please?

[Dimento Graven]

Sjorpha, on 24 January 2017 - 02:33 PM, said:

We have discussed a number of suggestions in this thread, we both want them big enough to actually balance the performance gap between the engines. Can you for starters accept that? That we actually want that? You should know I'm not a clan apologist at least if you read the forums.

The suggestions we have discussed have been: Higher speed than cXL, Significant agility buffs, structure/armour buffs. I'm in favor of increasing the reward rather than reduce the risk, because I think that is more fun. So my favorite solution is making the IS XL a bit faster and have significant agility buffs, making IS mechs better at avoiding damage while clan mechs are better at tanking/surviving it. How big do these advantages need to be? It would have to be tested a bit but I'm sure it can be done.

Also as you say the &quot;cumulative effect&quot; of all clan advantages doesn't get balanced by this. No obviously not. Are you suggesting the IS XL alone should be buffed so much that it balances the entire tech imbalance for everything else too? Sorry, that's ridiculous.

You have to make some kind of distinction what you are talking about. We are talking about the engines here. Obviosly weapons need to be balanced versus weapons and so on, but the way you harp on about &quot;ALL THE OTHER STUFF OMG!&quot; makes it impossible to talk rationally about the engines.

No, I'm not going to ignore all the other stuff, it's stupid to.

Think about it: The fact that most everything else in the Clan arsenal is smaller and lighter weight means that they're already running a fairly high rated XL engine.

Because of this, the typical Clan 'mech is already moving much faster and is more agile than their IS equivalent. So simply adding speed and agility buffs to an IS XL will probably only bring the IS 'mech up to par with the Clan 'mech's current speed and agility. To EXCEED that speed and agility, the IS 'mech will have to give up tonnage to run a same rated, or better, is XL, meaning less tonnage for armament.

At that point the IS XL "pilots" like a Clan, but again, the IS XL is still game over on ST loss. Doesn't do much for the fire power or range differences, nor any other benefits of all the other systemic differences, which you absolutely can't ignore when you're attempting to balance both sides.

[1453 R]

Dimento.

Stop. It.

Nobody is saying "add some speed to the iXL and then we're done!" This is a discussion about m*therf***ing engines. Once the engines are balanced, one can move on to balancing the weapons. Or the structural upgrades. Or the heat sinks. Or anything else. But you cannot buff the iXL, by itself, to such a point that it alone bridges the entirety of the tech divide.

A.) that leaves STD-engine Sphere 'Mechs still left in the dust.
B.) it's patently ridiculous as an idea.

Please. We're talking about engines. if you want to talk about C.A.S.E., or start the million and fourth thread about weapons, there's a button for that. This one's for engines. So talk about engines or please let us do so in your stead.

[Jay Leon Hart]

So what if...

STD engines provided an agility boost as well as armour and/or structure boosts to the torso sections?
IS XL engines also provided an agility boost (though less than STDs) and a cooling and/or heat capacity boost?

Giving the XLs a speed boost makes it even less likely we'll see MASC Light 'mechs, however making them run cooler may be a bit too much of an offensive boost, but just adding agility isn't enough to balance the fragility and adding armour/structure lessens the longevity gained from STDs...

Balance is hard, yo.

[Edit] Grammar, dawg [/Edit]

Edited by Jay Leon Hart, 24 January 2017 - 02:54 PM.

[1453 R]

Jay Leon Hart, on 24 January 2017 - 02:52 PM, said:

So what if...

STD engines provided an agility boost as well as armour and/or structure boosts to the torso sections?
IS XL engines also provided an agility boost (though less than STDs) and a cooling and/or heat capacity boost?

Giving the XLs a speed boost makes it even less likely we'll see MASC Light 'mechs, however making them run cooler may be a bit too much of an offensive boost, but just adding agility isn't enough to balance the fragility and adding armour/structure lessens the longevity of STDs...

Balance is hard, yo.

It really is.

STD engines should be a different beast than XLs. Before DImento and Johnny pitched a three-page fit, I believe one of the ideas that came up was for the iXL to get the speed/agility, the STD to get cooling-related options and durability, the LFE (when it comes out) to be a middle ground between the two, and for the cXL to fall somewhere between the LFE and the iXL. Get all the engines on the same line, with STD engines being Tankmasters, iXLs being the opposite extreme Formula 1 guys, and the LFE/cXL falling between those two.

Some mobility may be in order for the STD, but doing so blurs the lines and roles between and for each engine type and should be approached carefully. If it were me, I'd say start with mobility for the iXL, heat/durability for the STD, bring the LFE in with the FutureTech update this summer, and see where things need to go from there.

Edited by 1453 R, 24 January 2017 - 02:57 PM.

[Sjorpha]

Dimento Graven, on 24 January 2017 - 02:46 PM, said:

No, I'm not going to ignore all the other stuff, it's stupid to.

Think about it: The fact that most everything else in the Clan arsenal is smaller and lighter weight means that they're already running a fairly high rated XL engine.

Because of this, the typical Clan 'mech is already moving much faster and is more agile than their IS equivalent. So simply adding speed and agility buffs to an IS XL will probably only bring the IS 'mech up to par with the Clan 'mech's current speed and agility. To EXCEED that speed and agility, the IS 'mech will have to give up tonnage to run a same rated, or better, is XL, meaning less tonnage for armament.

At that point the IS XL "pilots" like a Clan, but again, the IS XL is still game over on ST loss. Doesn't do much for the fire power or range differences, nor any other benefits of all the other systemic differences, which you absolutely can't ignore when you're attempting to balance both sides.

You balance the heavier and larger IS equipment by making it more powerful than the lighter and smaller clan equipment. Ideally also with interesting mechanical differences.

If everything is actually worth the tonnage and crits it costs, then you won't need the engines to account for that.

I think the best current example is the IS LPL vs the Clan LPL. They both have upsides, but the IS LPL is the more powerful weapon for a number of reasons, if clanners could mount it on their mechs they actually would! It's worth the extra crit and ton.

Most other weapons don't accomplish this, so there is a lot of work to do, but the LPLs are a good model for the whole laser family, you can start by extrapolating the reasons why IS LPL is so good to the other IS lasers to make them competitive.

Autocannons already have interesting differences that can be tweaked. The IS pinpoint can be amplified with increased accuracy, and the Clan UACs can get more bullets in a stream if needed.

The largest challenge are equipment where clan tech is a strict upgrade, in the sense that there is no IS upside to tweak. These include the gauss rifles, where I'd suggest simply giving IS gauss the 3x range back, PPCs, where I thing IS should get heat and velocity advantage vs the clan splash damage, and DHS where I thing the IS DHS should simply be a little better. And so on.

[Dimento Graven]

1453 R, on 24 January 2017 - 02:39 PM, said:

Nobody should be looking for a "BETTER" chance. Yeebus, man.

Yep, you're absolutely right, that's absolutely the WRONG word to use.

It should have been "THE SAME".

I apologize.

Quote

The Sphere guy and the Clan guy should have equivalent chances of victory, if equal in tonnage and built for the same fight. That is what 'balance' means. The iXL does not need some sort of monster tweak that turns anything with one in it into Mechagodzilla. It needs something to pull its reward up commensurate with its risk.

The level of uptweak that requires is in part based on how much performance on the cXL decreases after a shoulder blowout. The harsher the penalty on the cXL, the weaker any prospective iXL buffs need to be to pull the two engines into rough parity, since the increased pre-blowout iXL performance is being offset by the non-death performance of the post-blowout cXL. Right now, the performance decrease is 40% reduction in heat sink efficiency and 20% reduced movement speed for Clan 'Mechs. That's a significant but not crippling penalty, which means the pre-blowout iXL requires a pretty nice performance package to bring it into line. ~5% speed and 20 extra points of mobility rating may well not be enough, though I would personally consider it a nice start point for (hopefully) incremental adjustment.

Insufficient. Again, you're going to have to significantly increase the mobility to make any measurable difference in IS survivability because the Clans are still typically going to be carrying larger more powerful weapons packages, allowing the to chew through that armor.

Again, once the IS XL sees an ST loss, game over.

Quote

But asking for an uptweak that allows an iXL guy to blow through all three torso sections of a Clan machine before the Clan guy can get through one is both ridiculous and disingenuous, as those times are both drastically affected by pilot skill, 'Mech design/role, range, and all those other messy battlefield things. It's not something you can just code into the game, and also that would be far too much uptweak and you know it.

Jeebus cod-whalloping sons of Wharvan...PLEASE PAY ATTENTION.

Yeah, "better" was absolutely the wrong word.

Quote

I'm not ignoring any of that, but this thread? This particular discussion? It is about ENGINES.. Not C.A.S.E.. Not Endo/Ferro. Not weapon balance. Not DHS. Engines. Engines, engines, engines, engines, ENGINES.

You do not fix C.A.S.E. by making cXL designs move like legged 'Mechs after shoulder blowout. That makes no damn sense. It has nothing to do with C.A.S.E.. You don't fix weapon balance by making cXL designs move like legged 'Mechs after shoulder blowout. That does literally nothing to redress any of the problems you have with Clan weaponry; all it does is make the Clan guy more irritable after he's already used his oh-so-superior pre-blowout armament to wreck your scheiss.

The thing that fixing engine discrepancies does is fix engine discrepancies. That's the single most major discrepancy to fix, so we're talking about fixing it. The rest can have its own thread. I've been over a dozen different points already. Can we talk about engines in the engines thread, please?

The problem is, changing ONLY the engine isn't enough, and won't be especially considering it's not just engines that you put in a 'mech.

You can't balance items in a vacuum, you just can't, PGI has been trying for the past 3 to 4 years since Clans were introduced and they've done nothing but spin their wheels.

The issue is cumulative effect of all the systems, and addressing systemic issues, on a piece-by-piece basis is a waste of time, because changing one thing in one place will have effects, or be affected by things in other places.

For example, as someone touched on earlier:

The IS XL is larger than the Clan.

If you want to load an IS XL in an IS 'mech and ALSO have an AC20 in the ST, sorry. You can't.

On a Clan 'mech you can AND have a slot to spare for ammo or a TC, or whatever.

If an IS decides he wants to load a gauss instead, because it'll barely fit, he's got to pray the RNG gives him his 10% non-splody gauss death if the weapon gets crit'd.

Sure, the Clans have a 100% chance of splodiness in their gauss, BUT, if they lose an ST because of it, they're STILL playing.

It.is.cumulative.

Edited by Dimento Graven, 24 January 2017 - 03:07 PM.

[Sjorpha]

1453 R, on 24 January 2017 - 02:56 PM, said:

...the LFE (when it comes out) to be a middle ground between the two...

I would start with just making LFE have 0 ST loss penalty and see what happens, IS mechs being fully combat efficient in the sense of speed and heat after losing the ST would not be nothing.

A mech like the Mauler MX90 would be a fricking beast with LFE and 4UAC5, it could either go max engine or slap on a PPC/LPL. The Atlas, moving to ASRM4 over 6 and going full engine while keeping the AC20...

[naterist]

CK16, on 24 January 2017 - 08:07 AM, said:

Did you think they MIGHT not have &quot;fixed&quot; the instant dead ST lose is because they are going to add the LFE for IS come this summer?

Yes.

I lol'd at the title.

[1453 R]

Sjorpha, on 24 January 2017 - 03:03 PM, said:

I would start with just making LFE have 0 ST loss penalty and see what happens, IS mechs being fully combat efficient in the sense of speed and heat after losing the ST would not be nothing.

A mech like the Mauler MX90 would be a fricking beast with LFE and 4UAC5, it could either go max engine or slap on a PPC/LPL. The Atlas, moving to ASRM4 over 6 and going full engine while keeping the AC20...

Heh, that's mostly what I meant, yeah. Not as tanky as the +Structure/-Heat STD, not as fast as the +Speed/+Mobility iXL, but falls nicely between the two ranges.

Frankly, looking at all the different armor/structure/engine upgrades possible in TableTop in this era and thinking of how they'd work and combine in MWO (Composite-structure light 'Mech for space AND weight at a comparatively negligible durability cost, LFE to avoid instagibs from unlucky Gauss hits to the shoulder, with Reflective armor to deal with laser hits and AMS to help combat Streaks? That sounds delightfully unhappy!) makes me smile. I'm so hoping Piranha knocks this one out of the part, however unlikely that may be.

Edited by 1453 R, 24 January 2017 - 03:11 PM.

[a gaijin]

Bombast, on 24 January 2017 - 08:28 AM, said:

It compares badly. A lot of people seem to think the LFE will replace the XL, but it wont. What it will do is replace the Standard engine in all but a handful of builds (The one's that need all 12 ST crits), while leaving the XL builds the same because those mechs NEED that tonnage to compete.

Like most of the Inner Sphere's 'Light' Solution (LFE, Light Ferro, Endo Composite), LFE is a half-assed solution that's novel and has a few uses, but ultimately makes very little difference to the game as a whole. It should be added, I think, to give the few mechs that would use it the help they need, but people shouldn't expect it to change the nature of Inner Sphere/Clan tech divide.

Everybody, just calm down. Don't worry! Even after the new tech is released things will remain unbalanced.

[Revis Volek]

All adding the LFE will do is create some extra builds, it won't help STD engines or STD engine builds nor will it help IS XL engines or mechs. IT just adds some diversity and if it turns out that new thing is better, everyone will gravitate to it and thus Power Creep is born.

PGI will never have any resemblance of balance in this game until they fix the glaring issue that is the XL power gap. Their latest statement on XL and STD engines and weather to buff or not has shown us that they in fact still dont see this issue, dont understand it and cannot even fathom a remedy because they are blind.


You're Out of touch, lost in the woods we said, gave suggestions some even insults, none of this has helped or shown PGI that they are doing nothing but chasing their own tail. Until they come to grips with the real issue we will go round and round the meta drain.

Its the only thing they have NOT touched to date, IS XL engines... and I have no idea why. I know what they do now could be seen as insane by certain definitions of the word though.

Edited by Revis Volek, 24 January 2017 - 05:20 PM.

[MechaBattler]

Hit the Deck, on 24 January 2017 - 09:54 AM, said:

We buff the IS by giving them more options like having greater number of equipment (e.g. number of weapons, armors, and yes, engine types), more consumable (*gasp*), or skill paths (soon).

Clan would be more vanilla and boring but basically a bit stronger 'Mech for 'Mech because of their superior tech (but not variety).

This is an indirect way to balance which I meant earlier.


EDIT: and by this, the balancing doesn't work 1 vs 1 but only when both sides bring a number of 'Mechs. Very hard to predict but seems to look better at least.

Variety is nice. But if none of them achieve anything special. Then what's the point? Variety is not an excuse to not buff under performing equipment.

They don't have to be the same. They don't even have to have the same buffs. Standard engines should be tankiest engine. IS XL could either agility or heat performance or something. The LFE can fall in between.

But they shouldn't flat out be inferior than the Clan XL. The only one that actually does something better is the standard engine. In the form of slots and not dying from two side torso loses. Being able to zombie mech hasn't really been standout good since the Clans came out.

That makes me think. What if when a standard loses both sides it gains a 30% cooldown to it's remaining weapons. Considering you only have enough room for 2 slots in the CT and 1 in the head. The best you can hope for is 3 medium pulse. Or SRMs for those mechs that have that option. Maybe a large pulse in the CT. Given how much firepower people run now, you won't live much longer anyway. But it would make you still dangerous on the way out.

[Y E O N N E]

LFE only balance out bread-and-butter laser boats (run the math, you get to run a Clan-competitive 52-alpha with 5xERML+3xLL and 19x DHS @ ~81 kph, but it all depends on isERML not being hotter than 4 heat and retaining a duration of 0.9 seconds). Missile boats, too, especially SRM bombers.

LFE assuage ballistic builds a little bit, but not by that much. Can run an AC/20 and lasers a little bit faster. Dual UAC/5 will still be superior on XL 'Mechs with their hard-points spread across two torso sections. The thing is, it's these dakka and dakka/PPC boats that are driving the game right now, so this is why the isXL really needs help.

[Hit the Deck]

Sjorpha, on 24 January 2017 - 02:59 PM, said:

...
The largest challenge are equipment where clan tech is a strict upgrade, in the sense that there is no IS upside to tweak.

To "balance" this, introduce more equipments for IS. The CASE II mentioned eralier which direct explosion damage to the outside is a good example.

This method doesn't guarantee balance though, It doesn't work 1 vs 1, needs IS players to be more resourceful in building and using their 'Mechs, and can't be predicted if it will balance at all.

What it offers is keeping the flavor by making IS able to beat Clan in an indirect way.

Revis Volek, on 24 January 2017 - 05:17 PM, said:

All adding the LFE will do is create some extra builds, it won't help STD engines or STD engine builds nor will it help IS XL engines or mechs. IT just adds some diversity and if it turns out that new thing is better, everyone will gravitate to it and thus Power Creep is born.
...

Heavy Gauss Rifles (and LB-X 20, ugh...) will make STD more relevant so they need to be introduced.

Maybe in the future with the release of more 'Mechs, there could be more optimal builds which neccessitates the use of STD. This is the reason for engine choice and their relevancy.

[Hit the Deck]

MechaBattler, on 24 January 2017 - 05:22 PM, said:

Variety is nice. But if none of them achieve anything special. Then what's the point? Variety is not an excuse to not buff under performing equipment.
...

If you keep thinking like this, then some time in the future you will hit the wall like how to balance isENDO/FERRO with cENDO/FERRO.

It works for weapons but not for all. Engines can thankfully still be adjusted and I'm not opposed to the idea. Still, sometimes you can't balance 1 vs 1.

[Y E O N N E]

Using CASE to balance things like Gauss explosions and IS XL is a horrid idea and you should be ashamed for suggesting it.