12 replies to this topic

[The Pug Commander]

List 5 things you would like to see PGI implement that make the system better. Keep it small wth reasons why after. Then list one that you think would drastically help when they go live.

1. More skill points for underperforming mechs
2. Cheaper cbill sink to skill the mech.
3. skill points per a catergory. Should not be able to pick most of the trees if using one weopon type.
4. Prior mastered mechs need some sort of discount on the cbill grind.
5. A grace period after fully skilling a mech. This so you can respect at a discount and reskill at a discount in case errors where made or try new build.


Important for going live.

Number 4

People will be less likely to get mad at a new system if it's cheap for them to play around with

[Fox2232]

1) no, all mechs must have same ability to travel across trees. There are already stronger and weaker nodes based on mech weight and IS vs Clan. Tunning can be additionally done on per mech basis (If needed, but Quirks still exist...)
2) initial cost of 100k is just fine, reskill for 125k is not fine
3) No, forces you to pick one of weapons even if you want none as you consider other nodes stronger
4) No
5) It is just part of your problem no.2. if point 2 gets solved properly, then there is no reason to deal with your no.5

[Ruar]

1. Ability to pick skills without having to select unwanted/unused skills to unlock the tree. The tree needs to be linear instead of mixed.

2. Reduced cost of skill points, 1500 is too much. Either a flat 750 per point or a sliding scale where the first 30 points are 500, the next 30 are 1000, and the last 31 are 1500.

3. Reduced cost to respec. By this I mean no cost. 9 million to unlock all the skills isn't horrible, but having to pay for a respec not acceptable. How are we supposed to experiment with different builds, buy more mechs, and buy equipment with costs on respeccing?

4. No cost for mirroring skills on the same mech chassis. If I want to make a drop deck with four of the exact same mech then I shouldn't be required to master that same mech four times. If I pick different skills then those should have to be purchased like new, but if I'm running the same build I shouldn't have to pay for it.

5. Jump jet tree needs more of a return. Right now you have to go down the entire tree to get equal to what we currently have on live. So either the baseline performance of jump jets needs improved and the JJ tree simply adds a bonus, or the JJ tree needs to be strong enough so that going half way down is equal to current then the rest is just bonus. The deeper levels could even give a smaller return so that the bonus isn't too much.

The first item on my list is the deal breaker. If I can't get my mech to the same performance as what I see on live then I'm not going to keep playing. The few battles I was in saw my ENF overheating faster, moving slower, jumping less, having less agility, and overall being nowhere near as much fun to play. If this goes live in it's current form I have no incentive to play this game.

Edited by Ruar, 10 February 2017 - 06:04 AM.

[Duke Nedo]

1. Engine balance
2. Weapons balance
3. Equipment balance
4. Poor mech balance
5. Gimmic squirk balance

[Bradigus]

1) Removal of weapon skills. It encourages boating. Put back the 5% weapon cooldown skill into the Mech Operation tree. Preferrably as two nodes, both worth 2,5%.

2) Upper chassis torso yaw speed percentage per skill node increased form 1% to 3% per node. This way, if you fully invest into the upper chassis tree, you get up to 15% more torso yaw speed. It is a considerable investment to go fully into the upper chassis, so it should be rewarded.

3) Equalize upper chassis mobility boosts between weight classes as well as clans and IS. I find it absolute nonsense that despite heavily investing into the upper chassis skill tree, a Dire Wolf will only get 4% increased torso yaw speed. This is 1% lower than it was before, and the Dire Wolf needs all the help it can get!

4) Bring two nodes of Radar Deprivation higher up in the Info Tech tree, so that players can at least get 40% worth of reduced target decay without having to invest wholly into the infotech tree.

5) Magazine Capacity skill node to apply to AMS, NARC, SRM, LRM and Streak SRM ammunition as well. Also, increase the number of Magazine Capacity skill nodes to 3 and put the other two between the Cool run and heat containment mid way through the sides of the Mech Operations tree.

Those, for starters. Returning the weapon quirks that were removed for this skill tree test as well removing the weapon skill trees, weapons will be more equal across the board and single weapon type boating won't become the new overlord. By removing the weapon skill trees, PGI can also reduce the amount of skill nodes we get to something like 50. That way, you can almost fully unlock 2-3 skill trees, and go halfway down a third.

There are a lot more problems with the skill tree that I couldn't fit into the top 5, such as the poor placement of pointless skill nodes, lack of value in others like the entirety of the jump jet skill tree.

Edited by Bradigus, 10 February 2017 - 09:07 AM.

[Skribs]

1. Agree, something to make underperforming Mechs or Mechs that lose modules gain some advantage.
2. Remove the C-Bill costs entirely and make respecs free.
3. Bring it to around 75k XP to master a Mech.
4. Combine all weapon skill trees into one.
5. Spread out the modules.

[bluesmith]

1. Node C-Bill cost reduced to 50,000 (4,550,000 for mastery); node XP cost reduced to 750 (68,250 - essentially what it is now - for mastery). Those prices are honestly still high, but they would be much more manageable and wouldn't completely price Pokemechers out of the game. Making respeccs free would also be nice, but maybe a more "fair" option would be to simply give out "Free Respecc Tokens" every now and again for events.

2. Pulse and Standard Laser trees combined. The weapon tree system encourages boating of a single weapon type enough already; at least let us mix laser types.

3. MG and Flamers "half tree" added. Since these are never primary weapon types, these trees should be "short and sweet" - just a few strong nodes.

4. Jump Jet and Upper Chassis trees massively buffed. Arm speed? +1% lift? These are totally worthless; essentially beginner traps. Maybe just remove arm speed and combine the Upper and Lower Torso trees. Jump jet lift % needs to be in increments of 5%. Vectoring must be MASSIVELY improved so as to turn Jump Jets almost into dashes for it to have any value.

5. Weapon nodes (really all nodes in general) need to scale by weight class just like armor nodes do. Lights need a bigger bang for their buck since they have much less to work with from the get-go, and heavies and assaults - the most dominant classes overall - don't need further buffs (a few chassis, like Victors, do, but those can be surgically buffed via baseline quirks or some other method).

BONUS 6. Remove the tree "web" structure completely and make nodes linear categorical investments. If you find noone is investing in hill climb buff it or remove it, don't force us to take it so we can get the "real" nodes. The current "web" structure simply makes more nodes "must haves" and cuts down on customization options.

Edited by bluesmith, 10 February 2017 - 08:03 AM.

[Monkey Lover]

#1 mech balance , biggest issue.
#2 progressive cbill/XP pricing on nodes
#3 cleaner gui, even basic sound effects on clicking nodes
#4 extra nodes for mechs with extra module slots
#5 Allow us to go upwards on selecting nodes.

Bonus #6 jump tree needs to be cheaper or need a very good bonus at the bottom to be worth using.

Edited by Monkey Lover, 10 February 2017 - 08:04 AM.

[Orville Righteous]

1) Auxiliary Tree rework. Narc, UAV, and Capture Assist shouldn't be intermingled. I think there should just be linear choices allowing a player to buy a Narc upgrade, UAV upgrade or Capture Assist. I don't see this tree being used as is.

2) Don't force people to buy things like Hill Climb, Improved Gyros, and Speed Retention in the Mech Operations tree. I think they should be off to the side in Mech Operations and have their own linear path. How many bought these modules? I know I didn't. The way it's currently arranged, I bought Hill Climb and Improved Gryos (not all nodes), but I really wanted to avoid Speed Retention.

3) The Jump Jet tree should be looked at, I'm not sure if the Vent Calibration and Lift Speed do enough. Maybe buff them a bit.

4) Defensive, you can avoid AMS Overload. I really wish you could avoid Fall Damage. Can things get rearranged so you don't need to get Fall Damage?

5) Upper Chassis. I didn't notice much from this tree. I respec'ed out of it and never bought it again. I could see myself wanting Torso speed, but the arm pitch doesn't seem useful.

[Barantor]

1. Reduced initial cost per node or "end load" higher cost towards the nodes further in a tree.
2. System to add points to mechs with mixed hardpoints over those that boat.
3. Reduced critical chance over and even lower for laser weaponry of all types.
4. More %/points added to certain nodes for mechs that use those historically/lore.
5. Skill tree starting at the bottom and going up.

[DGTLDaemon]

1. Reduce the XP cost of mastering a mech to roughly the present level (56k XP). What we have now on PTS (136k) is waaay too grindy. People have lives outside of MWO, ya know. Reducing the node XP cost to 750 XP would be reasonable.
2. Reduce the C-Bill cost of mastering a mech to about 6 million total. This would be equivalent to a couple of weapon modules or one expensive mech module (Radar Derp/Seismic).
3. Redo the skill trees so that skills are no longer locked behind other, totally unrelated skills. Like, why on earth do you need to pick up Target Info Gathering to get to Radar Deprivation etc? Let us customize our mechs by choosing the skills we want, and stop shoving unwanted skills down our throats.
4. Do something about respec costs, because the proposed system punishes experimentation hard. Maybe give players a grace period of a few days during which you can respec for free if you don't like your new build? Or offer at least one free respec per mech?
5. Make a common Historical XP pool per chassis instead of locking it to each individual variant. Since we're moving away from the "rule of three", people will be dumping some of the mechs they were forced to basic/elite/master in order to get the mechs they wanted. That XP shouldn't go to waste.

[Hoshi Toranaga]

1. Scrap the whole thing and leave the game as is
2. make more content (maps, maps, maps)
3. make more game modes
4. find another money sink that does not screw old players
5. see 1.

[Bud Crue]

1. Stop nerfing already crapy mechs.
2. Requirk base line values of all mechs, clan and IS so that every variant has a niche. Why you are removing/minimizing the "character" based quirks is a mystery. If you want to get rid of more than one basic variant per mech, just do it and give folks full purchase price refunds (see Black Knights for example).
3. Make the squirks tree an actual tree...with branches that reflect choices with actual pros and cons.
4. If you are adamant in the hominigization of most mech variants (see #2 above), allow folks to pool their XP by mech chassis not just limited to individual variants.
5. Find a base line for hard point number/weight class and height. Mechs with lower hard points (on average) and/or fewer hard points than the base line get more nodes. Those with higher (on average) or more than the base line get less nodes. May want to give node bonuses for mechs with comparatively low engine caps too. Consider something similar for those with terrible hit boxes as well (though you would need to play the game to determine this).