85 replies to this topic

[WardenWolf]

I'm not sure what the current status of heatsinks in MW:O is, as I am not in the beta, but I have been playing around with various TT customization tools - and it seems to me that a no-brainer upgrade for every mech is double heatsinks. There is no downside to upgrading to them if you stick with the standard 10 heatsinks that come with a mech's engine: you simply get twice the heat dissipation with no added weight or critical usage.

That seems overpowered, to me, and shifts power in the favor of high-heat weapons (energy and large ACs). It also defies logic: added double heatsinks take up three times the space of normal ones, but ten can fit just fine in an engine without any increase in room used?

This got me thinking about how it could be implemented in MW:O without having the same overpowering issues... and I think I have a good idea! What if there was no 'upgrading' to double heatsinks: your engine just has a set amount of heat dissipation it is capable of, period. You can then add on top of that either single or double heatsinks: the trade-off is space vs weight: a DHS dumps the same heat as two singles for half the weight, but takes up 50% more space on the mech. You could even mix and match them, as needed.

That seems like it would make things much more flexible, and allow for higher-heat mech designs without them being too powerful. Any thoughts or criticisms? (I know this gets away from strict TT rules, but I think this change is worth that)

[Redshift2k5]

I had the same idea already.

Do not give any bonus heat dissipationg to the free heatsinks mounted in the engine.

Individually-mounted DHS would, of course, save you a ton in exchange for taking up additional criticals, and no mixing HS/DSH, which could be troublesome in some cases. Can't put a DHS in a leg, can't put it in Head or CT, really limits where you can slot them and what sort of weapon systems you can use

[Rhyshaelkan]

IS DHSs are a slippery slope. Add them to your 'mech if you like. Once you get past the ones held by the engine, they rapidly eat up criticals. Keeping you from using other weight saving tech like FF ES and XL.

The same goes for XL Engines. Use them if you like, but their fragility will be a slap in the face to some.

IS "high tech" is much more balanced than Clan tech.

Edited by Rhyshaelkan, 20 July 2012 - 08:40 AM.

[Madog]

Remembering back to TT, as you used more and more of the recovered lostech you had to make trade offs. For the IS DHS, you need 3 crit spaces for each DHS (excluding those in the engine.). It pretty much limits you to placing them in the arms and RT/LT. For mechs with a lot of weapons, or large weapons, this ends up getting cramped. Throw in an XL engine and you have even less room. And then when Endo Steel and Ferro Fiberous come out, you have to make even more trade offs.

Generally I used double heat sinks to make existing designs more efficient, or cut back on those that are using 20+ single HS.

Yep -- I rarely use XL in the game. And once FF and ES are available I might compeltely drop XL engines.

Rhyshaelkan, on 20 July 2012 - 08:39 AM, said:

The same goes for XL Engines. Use them if you like, but their fragility will be a slap in the face to some.

[WardenWolf]

Redshift2k5, on 20 July 2012 - 08:39 AM, said:

Individually-mounted DHS would, of course, save you a ton in exchange for taking up additional criticals, and no mixing HS/DSH, which could be troublesome in some cases. Can't put a DHS in a leg, can't put it in Head or CT, really limits where you can slot them and what sort of weapon systems you can use

A question: why not allow mixing of single and double heatsinks? If you are getting away from having the in-engine heatsinks 'change' at all, then what would be the harm? I could see someone wanting to use the leg and head crits for singles, and then stack a few doubles elsewhere... and that doesn't seem like it would be overpowered, or am I missing something?

Madog, on 20 July 2012 - 08:45 AM, said:

Generally I used double heat sinks to make existing designs more efficient, or cut back on those that are using 20+ single HS.

See, this is the exact problem I have with the TT implementation of double heatsinks: you get a free doubling of dissipation on mechs with no 'cost' in crits or tonnage. That seems imbalanced, and is something I would like to see addressed in MW:O if possible.

[Icebound]

It seems to me that you should put in as many doubles as you can fit, but they take up I believe they take up triple the space on your mech compared to normal heatsinks. So you'll eventually hit a point where you can't rely only on doubles.

Edited by Icebound, 20 July 2012 - 08:51 AM.

[Rhyshaelkan]

WardenWolf, on 20 July 2012 - 08:47 AM, said:

A question: why not allow mixing of single and double heatsinks? If you are getting away from having the in-engine heatsinks 'change' at all, then what would be the harm? I could see someone wanting to use the leg and head crits for singles, and then stack a few doubles elsewhere... and that doesn't seem like it would be overpowered, or am I missing something?


See, this is the exact problem I have with the TT implementation of double heatsinks: you get a free doubling of dissipation on mechs with no 'cost' in crits or tonnage. That seems imbalanced, and is something I would like to see addressed in MW:O if possible.

In for a penny in for a pound. Mixing heat sinks is not in TT. Piranha Games is doing what it can to stick to the board game.

Edited by Rhyshaelkan, 20 July 2012 - 08:55 AM.

[Redshift2k5]

Mixing them would be an advantage: You could put singles in the legs, head, CT, and doubles in the RT, LT, RA, LA.

not being able to mix them is one of the costs you have to pay for the double weight:heat dissipation ratio. Many mech loadouts have lots of extra criticals, so the extra critical is not a large price to pay for those builds. No mixing is part of the tradeoff that makes DHS more of a sidegrade than a pure upgrade

SOME mechs it is a pure upgrade, other it is not such an obvious improvement. somemechswill get more bang for your buck with an XL engine instead, or some other type of lostech. As a WHOLE lostech upgrades are not an instant i-win button because of extra, sometimes less obvious, costs. (such as no heatsinks in your legs if you use DHS)

[WardenWolf]

The only other way I can think to balance double heatsinks, if folks want to stick with the doubling of the heatsinks in the engine, is to limit them to only variants that they came on. In fact, this might not be a bad idea for EndoSteel and possible FF armor too... but I'd prefer to see a more open MechLab, just with changes from TT that fix some of the imbalance issues.

I am also struggling to think of any mech where upgrading (in the traditional TT manner) to double heatsinks is *not* a clear and immediate benefit. Sure, you can't fit any DHS in the legs, CT, or heat - so you lose out on the possibility of 7 single heatsink spots. However, you immediately gain the equivalent of 10 single heatsinks, without needing any space at all... so how could it ever be better to stick with singles?

I would contend that in virtually *any* mech it would be better to go with double heatsinks (again, under TT rules) than singles - you will either get free extra heat dissipation, or the same or superior dissipation with less tonnage used. Having something like that where there are two options and one is *always* the better choice is a waste in games - they might as well do away with single heatsinks in that case, and make everything double. There *needs* to be a trade-off, and I think eliminating the free upgrade of engine heatsinks is the way to do it

[ExAstris]

WardenWolf, on 20 July 2012 - 09:10 AM, said:

so how could it ever be better to stick with singles?

...

There *needs* to be a trade-off, and I think eliminating the free upgrade of engine heatsinks is the way to do it

To the former, in TT rules, if your engine was too small (I think it was anything below 200), then for every 25 it was below that size you had to mount one of those "free" heat sinks in your mech's critical slots. So a mech using a 150 engine had to mount 2 of its 10 free heat sinks in the internal structure. The only design I ever came up with that ended up benefiting from SHS over DHS was a 100ton walking turret mech that used 4 gauss rifles as weaponry and a 100 rated engine. It didn't have the slots for the doubles and didn't generate enough heat to care about then. There are potentially several light mech designs that would benefit in a similar fashion should their weapon loadout not have such serious heat demands.

But basically, 95% of designs are indeed a straight upgrade without drawback when the engine sinks are gimmies.

To the latter, that would be a reasonable solution to me.



To the OP, I think this is a serious hurdle for balance that needs to be adressed, and the Devs have remained silent on the issue. I've even made similar threads about how to smooth out this upgrade curve, and have asked in multiple Ask The Devs what their plans are for Double Heat Sinks to no avail.

I can understand if they've remained silent about details because they're still investigating the best way to handle this. It is after all, a balance issue which is one of the final things to be finalized in any game, but it would still be nice to at least have an acknowledgement from the devs that this concern is on their radar.

[VanillaG]

ExAstris, on 20 July 2012 - 09:31 AM, said:

To the former, in TT rules, if your engine was too small (I think it was anything below 200), then for every 25 it was below that size you had to mount one of those "free" heat sinks in your mech's critical slots. So a mech using a 150 engine had to mount 2 of its 10 free heat sinks in the internal structure. The only design I ever came up with that ended up benefiting from SHS over DHS was a 100ton walking turret mech that used 4 gauss rifles as weaponry and a 100 rated engine. It didn't have the slots for the doubles and didn't generate enough heat to care about then. There are potentially several light mech designs that would benefit in a similar fashion should their weapon loadout not have such serious heat demands.

But basically, 95% of designs are indeed a straight upgrade without drawback when the engine sinks are gimmies.

To the latter, that would be a reasonable solution to me.



To the OP, I think this is a serious hurdle for balance that needs to be adressed, and the Devs have remained silent on the issue. I've even made similar threads about how to smooth out this upgrade curve, and have asked in multiple Ask The Devs what their plans are for Double Heat Sinks to no avail.

I can understand if they've remained silent about details because they're still investigating the best way to handle this. It is after all, a balance issue which is one of the final things to be finalized in any game, but it would still be nice to at least have an acknowledgement from the devs that this concern is on their radar.

Slight math fail, any engine 250 or above would not have to equip heatsinks. After that, every 25 pts of engine can mount 1 additional heatsink in the engine with only the weight being taken into account and no critical slots being used. So an Atlas with a 400 engine could mount 6 more heatsinks with 6 tons used and no criticals.

The downside to double heatsinks is that they cost more than singles and the additional space that is required to mount them if they are not part of the engine. It really boils down to if you are weight limited or critical space limited as to which ones you should mount.

[herektir]

The best way to balance this out really is to make the cost of retrofitting the engine with doubles instead of singles somewhat prohibitive(which doesnt even include the cost of the hs themselves, there are labour costs afterall). Could also very well make every double heatsink 3x or more the cost of a normal single and losing one in a battle would be painful.

[Garth Erlam]

Great ideas guys, keep 'em coming!

[WardenWolf]

Garth Erlam, on 20 July 2012 - 10:16 AM, said:

Great ideas guys, keep 'em coming!

Thanks for stopping by, Garth Hope you get to relax some this weekend - you guys have been keeping busy up there!

ExAstris, on 20 July 2012 - 09:31 AM, said:

I can understand if they've remained silent about details because they're still investigating the best way to handle this. It is after all, a balance issue which is one of the final things to be finalized in any game, but it would still be nice to at least have an acknowledgement from the devs that this concern is on their radar.

Well, now we know they are at least aware of the issues we raised

[William Boone]

Availability of Engines with Double Heat Sinks and also Double Heat Sinks would be the limiting factor. Keep in mind that double heat sinks is relatively new at this point. The vast majority of Mechs use standard engines with single heat sinks, and thus most engines built will still have single heat sinks. Normally the XL engines costed four times what a standard engine would cost at this time. Given the heat efficiency a double heat sink engine could easily fetch twice that if you wanted. As the game progresses and more and more folks earn more money this obviously would be less of a disadvantage but that's true with any new technology. Say by 3055 costs would have gone down to normal and about half the engines produced would have double heat sinks after so many destroyed mechs in the war.

Given the hardpoint and space restriction beyond the Table Top game and previous computer games this will not be as big a problem as you might think. I'm not in beta but I've heard we don't get the full space of a record sheet in most mechs, this means that you might even be more severely limited on heat sink space.

I do not agree with mixing heat sink types though as pointed out earlier that would just be an advantage allowing them to go into more areas of the mech.

[Felicitatem Parco]

I say you should not be able to mix the heatsinks; your heatsink configuration would also be determined by the Engine you have. If you have an engine with single heatsinks, then forget about "upgrading" to double heatsinks... you have to buy a new engine. Buy an engine with double heatsinks and you can then load more double heatsinks in your Mech. Creating a new market product (engines with double heatsinks) will bring more money in, too.

As I figure, the extra spaces taken up by double heatsinks would actually prevent you from mounting double heatsinks in some locations where you could normally be mounting single heatsinks, thereby creating an annoyance and limiting your builds. That's a drawback to the tonnage it frees up.

[Gendo]

dont forget: DHS can be destoyed with ONE hit - losing 2 points of cooling capacity instead of 1 with SHS. plus SHS mounted in legs will act at DHS when in water (not possible with DHS-IS, lets have a pool party! ). DHS space/efficency relation is also bad. overall i dont see a need to nerf DHS for they are already ballanced to me. i see them as an "sidegrade", not an upgrade - like XL engines.

Edited by Gendo, 20 July 2012 - 12:02 PM.

[WardenWolf]

Gendo, on 20 July 2012 - 11:58 AM, said:

dont forget: DHS can be destoyed with ONE hit - losing 2 points of cooling capacity instead of 1 with SHS. plus SHS mounted in legs will act at DHS when in water (not possible with DHS-IS, lets have a pool party! ). DHS space/efficency relation is also bad. overall i dont see a need to nerf DHS for they are already ballanced to me. i see them as an "sidegrade", not an upgrade - like XL engines.

On their own, comparing one DHS to two normal HS, they are indeed a 'sidegrade': one takes up less tonnage but is 'weaker', the other takes up less crits but weighs more. No problem at all there!

The problem comes from the first 10 heatsinks you get 'with your engine' according to TT. Those magically changing from single to double is *huge* and a clear upgrade, with no downside to weight or crits. This is where I find DHS to be imbalanced, and is what I was encouraging a fix for

[Paj]

WardenWolf, on 20 July 2012 - 12:19 PM, said:

The problem comes from the first 10 heatsinks you get 'with your engine' according to TT. Those magically changing from single to double is *huge* and a clear upgrade, with no downside to weight or crits.

Except that they can take up extra space. You get the weight of 10 heat sinks for free, but you get the space of engine rating/25, rounded down placed in the engine. For example, the Hunchback has a 200 rated engine, meaning it can only fit 8 inside its engine, the remaining 2 free, and any extra have to placed in the chassis. Conversly the Atlas with a 300 rated engine can fit 12 in the engine, so all the free heatsink, and 2 additional before it start having to any extras in the chassis. (TT rules, I don't know how it's implemented in the game, yet)

Having said all of that, unless it is a very light, the upgrade to double heatsinks is often the most effective upgrade you can make.

[Redshift2k5]

WardenWolf, on 20 July 2012 - 12:19 PM, said:

On their own, comparing one DHS to two normal HS, they are indeed a 'sidegrade': one takes up less tonnage but is 'weaker', the other takes up less crits but weighs more. No problem at all there!

The problem comes from the first 10 heatsinks you get 'with your engine' according to TT. Those magically changing from single to double is *huge* and a clear upgrade, with no downside to weight or crits. This is where I find DHS to be imbalanced, and is what I was encouraging a fix for

Which is why the OP and I suggest the free engine-equipped sinks should not give you any additional heat capacity/ton-saving. If you want benefits from your DHS, they should only come from ones you are slotting into your mech because those come with actual balance trade-offs to pay for the free tons (number of slots, location restrictions, more vulnerable to critical hits).

Of course the alternative would be to make such an engine very costly, but a costly engine is only going to result in an imbalanced playing field with 'rich' players able to afford to repair costly components, and letting them get even richer, while C-bill-poor players can't afford to field a mech with DHS-engines. Cost only is not the best balancing measure, there should be other ways in which an item is balanced vs it's alternative.

(on a related note, no, I don't know how FF and ES are going to be balanced vs the alternative except to say 'they will benefit light/medium mechs with free crits more than they will benefit Assaults with lots of guns and few available crits)