51 replies to this topic

[ArmageddonKnight]

Greetings.

This is some feedback bassed on my experience on the PTS in regards to the new skill system.

To stop yee wall o text im using spoilers

Overall

Spoiler

First and foremost, the layout of each individual bonus within a skill tree is bad.

The current system on PTS forces users to put points into possibly useless bonuses that they dont want or may not even need.
For example, Radar Deprevation is somthing everyone wants, but you have to unlock almost the entire tree to get it, and UAC jam chance reduction, any1 that uses alot of UAC's or uses the smaller variety which have fast CD's will NEED jam chance reduction, but again you have to unlock the usless CD reduction and velocity bonuses to get it.

Same goes for almost eveything in the current skill tree system on PTS, u ether unlock the entire tree, or dont touch it.

This is NOT going to give much variety on any given mech. Everyone will need or want speed tweek, all the bonuses to torso and arm turn speed/amount, heat managment bonuses, and the armor bonuses etc etc. But eveyrone will have to unlock the entire tree for said bonuses, leaving very few , if any, points available for variation.

Specifics

Spoiler

Where is the replacment bonus for weapon Convergence ?

AC Magazine capacity bonus seems to be 15% to 20% bonus to ammo.
BUT
AC2 and UAC2 only get 13.4% increase. And this is a weapon that has a low CD so it churns through ammo.
It looks even worse if u look at the bonus damage your getting, with U/AC2 only getting 10 rounds resulting in 20 damage while U/AC5 gets 50 damage, U/AC10 gets 100 damage, U/AC20 get 80 damage ..and so on. The U/AC2 is getting shafted here.
Ether choose a flat % increase across the board like 20%, or a flat damage bonus across the board like 40 (so AC2 would get 20 rounds, AC5 8 rounds, AC10 4 rounds, AC20 2 rounds.)
Ether way at the very least AC2 as a fast firing low damage weapon should have the highest bonus to ammo capacity. .

Armor Bonus. it is not correctly applying 10% to the mech. If you have 130 Front CT armor and 5 Rear you should get 13 front bonus and 0.5 rear armor, im getting only 11 front and 0 rear. Getting the same odd numbers regardless of front / rear balance or mech size.
IMO the bonus to armor should be given bassed on the max amount of armor for a given part. So if CT is 135 split aross front and rear, then you should get 13.5 bonus armor for the PLAYER to decide where to put it.

UAC2 jam duration change. NO... just... NO. 4 seconds is waaaaaay to long for a UAC2 to be jammed for regardless of the jam chance. On live its 3 seconds, and even that is to long, if anything it needed lowering not increasing.
I honestly dont understand your thought process on this one.
The faster a AC reloads the faster it should unjam, Thus a UAC2 should unjam much faster than a UAC20, since the UAC2 is going to jam more anyway due to its faster ROF.
If you must increase UAC2 Jam duration to 4sec as a base, then replace the crappy 4% C-UAC2 cooldown bonus to -50% jam duration (4x -12.5% Jam duration).

The AC2 skill tree, its usless. I boat 6 Ac2's on a King Crab, i wont be touching the skill tree for them as they wont do sh*t all to their performance. Especialy when more important bonuses for armor, agility, speed, and utility use up most if not all the 91 possible skill points.
What the AC tree does need is seperat bonuses for the AC sizes, for the AC2 in particular it needs a bigger CD bonus and/or a reduction in heat. 0.6 heat down to 0.4 heat (33%) would make a noticable difference, as would 0.72 reload down to 0.5 (30%).
Changing the AC2 cooldown bonuses from 1% to 6.5% would do, and adding in 5 bonuses of -6% to heat would work.

Heat & Alpha meta

Spoiler

:So im thinking PGI need to address the high alpha meta, and this new skill system is the perfect opportunity.

With the smaller CD bonuses people r going to rely even more so on alpha striking, as such, a way to reduce alpha damage without stopping people from chucking on loads of weapons would be the following.

Remove heat containment from the bonus list.
This will lower heat capacity, from a possible 46 back down to the standard 40.
In its place....
Ether:
Buff 'Cool Run' by 50%
Or
In place of 'Heat Containment' have a bonus that adds the same as 'Cool Run' BUT with a negative effect of -3% heat capacity per skill.

The latter idea would result in Double Cool Run bonus with - 15% heat capacity lowering the standard 40 down to 34.
The effect:
A reduction in the amount of damage that can be fired in 1 shot (alpha) but an increase in stagered fire for those who choose the additional cooling efficency skill.
This would promote more balanced builds and allow players to stop being insta killed by multiple high damage alpha strikes.

I dont particularly care about what costs you put on the skill tree are so long as its worth it and gives you choice, the current system does not.

Edited by ArmageddonKnight, 12 February 2017 - 08:50 AM.

[Vidarion]

With respect to:

ArmageddonKnight, on 10 February 2017 - 09:40 AM, said:

The current system on PTS forces users to put points into possibly useless bonuses that they dont want or may not even need.

For example, Radar Deprevation is somthing everyone wants, but you have to unlock almost the entire tree to get it.

This is sort of the point of the skill tree. It's forcing variety into the game. The 'meta' is being changed. Right now, you grind away for XP and everyone is able to unlock Radar Dep and then it's a module to drop into the mech to get it. There's no impact to spending your XP on RD vs other things and so everyone basically runs the same module set and (to some extent) weapon loadout. The skill tree implementation changes that meta. People will be able to make choices that better reflect their play style (reduced heat gen, faster cooldown, reduced duration for vomit builds; etc). So yes, there are things that people will say "I want X but I don't want to spend all the points on Y and Z to get there".

And that's good.

Same with speed tweak. 'Everyone will need / want ST'. Yep. But do you really need it? Or is it just a 'oh, I need speed tweak to finish eliting the chassis'? Yeah, speed tweak is nice but right now it's just "because it's there to complete the Elite skills". Mechs run perfectly fine without it. It's not a game changer.

[Padre Balistique]

Vidarion, on 10 February 2017 - 10:18 AM, said:

With respect to:


This is sort of the point of the skill tree. It's forcing variety into the game. The 'meta' is being changed. Right now, you grind away for XP and everyone is able to unlock Radar Dep and then it's a module to drop into the mech to get it. There's no impact to spending your XP on RD vs other things and so everyone basically runs the same module set and (to some extent) weapon loadout. The skill tree implementation changes that meta. People will be able to make choices that better reflect their play style (reduced heat gen, faster cooldown, reduced duration for vomit builds; etc). So yes, there are things that people will say "I want X but I don't want to spend all the points on Y and Z to get there".

And that's good.

Same with speed tweak. 'Everyone will need / want ST'. Yep. But do you really need it? Or is it just a 'oh, I need speed tweak to finish eliting the chassis'? Yeah, speed tweak is nice but right now it's just "because it's there to complete the Elite skills". Mechs run perfectly fine without it. It's not a game changer.

Variety is "chose this, or that"

the skill tree is "want that? take these 3 terrible skills because connect the dots."

[ArmageddonKnight]

I dont see how forcing people through a tree of crap to get a bonus 'most' people will want is going to promote variety.

Appreciate your comments though.

Edited by ArmageddonKnight, 10 February 2017 - 10:21 AM.

[Padre Balistique]

variety is also expanding the skill tree so each chassis's tree has some unique things.

Like the atlas tree should have options exceed the bog standard armor quirks to turn it into an heavily armored juggernaut that will crawl forward through withering fire to consume your souls, like its supposed to be in lore and PGIs own opinion. (which its not, cause its fragile, and the ST bug makes it almost impossible to drive)

Raven's are more stealthy scouts and should have a tree that allows you to exemplify those aspects.

Hunchbacks should also have a lot more defense points on its tree, since it was literally made as an urban street fighter brawler.

enforcers should get skill trees that exemplify autocannon range and frontal armor, since its roll was basically a formation buster.

In more simple terms, There should be generic quirks on every tree, but you create variety by emphasizing the roles that certain mechs have by giving every mech a few trees that exemplify its specialty, allowing players the CHOICE of sinking into those unique chassis specialties or the CHOICE of turning it into a more well rounded platform.

Edited by Padre Balistique, 10 February 2017 - 10:33 AM.

[Vidarion]

@Padre: So for the Atlas you take the defensive and offensive trees and for the Raven you take the infotech, operations, and agility trees. You only get 91 skill points per chassis so you take the nodes to build the mech you want. Not everyone is going to load up on defense in their hunchback and not everyone is going to have ACs on their enforcer.

The uniqueness in the chassis is going to come from the player's loadout decisions now.

As for the 'useless' nodes to get the ones that 'most people' want, the fact that most people want them sort of points out that those things might be overpowered. Now people need to actually think about their builds and what they value most. If people really really really need radar deprivation to play their mech, then they need to make that decision and buy the skill nodes to get it.

And, honestly, if you think that target decay, info gathering, and sensor range are 'useless', you might check your definition of 'useless'.

To get 100% radar deprivation now, you're also getting:

• 1.4s additional target decay
  
• 6% faster target info gathering
  
• 8% longer sensor range
  
• 200m range for holding targets that move behind you (360 degree target lock)

I dunno. Those all seem really nice to have in addition to the 100% radar deprivation.

As for the AC skill trees, you don't have to take cooldown or jam chance (in the UAC tree) to get the enhanced range and velocity so 'not touching the tree' seems like you're shooting yourself in the foot. Getting all the nodes in a particular tree doesn't grant you an additional bonus so there's no need to take nodes you don't want. Instead of taking the cooldown / jam chance nodes on that dakka KC, maybe you put those points into survival or mobility nodes instead.

Edited by Vidarion, 10 February 2017 - 11:08 AM.

[Padre Balistique]

Vidarion, on 10 February 2017 - 11:03 AM, said:

@Padre: So for the Atlas you take the defensive and offensive trees and for the Raven you take the infotech, operations, and agility trees. You only get 91 skill points per chassis so you take the nodes to build the mech you want. Not everyone is going to load up on defense in their hunchback and not everyone is going to have ACs on their enforcer.

The uniqueness in the chassis is going to come from the player's loadout decisions now.

Giving the Atlas and the Kodiak, and the locust, the same armor quirks is not unique or provide variety.

[Vidarion]

Padre Balistique, on 10 February 2017 - 11:17 AM, said:

Giving the Atlas and the Kodiak, and the locust, the same armor quirks is not unique or provide variety.

You should replace 'giving' with 'taking' to be accurate and reflect the nature of the tree. Just because the node exists doesn't mean it's in effect. If you spend points unlocking armor quicks on a locust, it's because you want a heavily armored locust capable of slugging it out with heavier mechs instead of taking speed quirks to run circles around them.

If you want to talk about 'not unique or provide variety', you can look at the existing skill system. Every mech has the exact same skill unlocks regardless of usefulness (torso twist angle on an Urbanmech is the definition of useless). And with the ability to unlock every module, it means that almost everyone uses the same module loadout (radar dep + seismic). THAT is textbook lack of variety.

[Padre Balistique]

Vidarion, on 10 February 2017 - 11:39 AM, said:

You should replace 'giving' with 'taking' to be accurate and reflect the nature of the tree. Just because the node exists doesn't mean it's in effect. If you spend points unlocking armor quicks on a locust, it's because you want a heavily armored locust capable of slugging it out with heavier mechs instead of taking speed quirks to run circles around them.

If you want to talk about 'not unique or provide variety', you can look at the existing skill system. Every mech has the exact same skill unlocks regardless of usefulness (torso twist angle on an Urbanmech is the definition of useless). And with the ability to unlock every module, it means that almost everyone uses the same module loadout (radar dep + seismic). THAT is textbook lack of variety.

I find it extremely disingenuous that you completely ignoring the existence of quirks in the current system, which generally give some boost to the systems that that the mechs have hardpoints for, sure there are weapon specific quirks, but there are also generic energy/ballistic/etc quirks allowing you to build something unique and interesting. Also since you bring up the current system, I can change out, say, my LPL Cooldown and Range for a AC20 Cooldown and ML Cooldown, if i want to try something new, without having to pay millions to respec and redo a tedious tree. Which again, allows variety and uniqueness.

Edited by Padre Balistique, 10 February 2017 - 12:16 PM.

[Knighthawk26]

And the cost in c-bills is too high. I will get back 177 million c-bills from my current modules when the change hits. I have 62 mechs over 40 are elite or mastered. With the money I get back I can only make 19 of my mechs "elite" again. And it will take a long time at 9.1 million per mech to get the other 20 plus mechs back to where they are now.

I don't like swapping modules, but right now I can do it. PGI needs to take that into account and reduce the c'bill cost for skills

[Dino1a]

why only 91 points? I would also like to see a more linear tree. Adding an extra skill or two I can deal with but 4 or 5 ?

[Hotthedd]

Overall I really like the new skill tree system. I could live with the current implementation, as it IS an improvement over what we currently have.

@ArmageddonKnight: Look at Radar Deprivation as costing 20 nodes and millions of C-bills and EXP on the skill tree (but you ALSO get the other bonuses that Vidarion mentions) instead of 1 node and 100K C-bills (but you have to have a bunch of other "crap"). Right now, Radar Deprivation costs 6 million C-bills, thousands of GXP, and takes a module slot (and you DON'T get those extra bonuses).
IMHO, that is the way skill trees are supposed to work. It forces choices. No 'mech can have all of the best features.

@Knighthawk26: I think the price in C-bills is about right. First, the game NEEDS C-bill sinks. Second, there is no need to have 100+ fully mastered 'mechs. It goes against the entire BTU. The only way I could be pro-Pokemech is if there were associated costs with maintenance, travel, repair, and re-arm, like there is in the BTU.

@Padre Ballistique: I agree with your suggestion that each individual chassis (or variant) should have a "unique" skill unlock. It would have to be at the end of the tree, perhaps having to unlock every node in a certain tree. I think that would add to the game.

@Dino1a: 91 points is (I believe) a starting point. PGI may decide that 91 pts is too much or too little based on the PTS. I would suggest that instead of quirks that number could be used to help under-performing chassis! For example, if the Grasshopper is still seen as too weak after the new skill tree, PGI could decide that the Grasshopper gets 100 skill points. The player would still need to spend time/money to actually use them, however.

TL;DR:
I like the skill tree system, and would suggest that
1. There be a "unique" skill available for each chassis, and
2. The number of available nodes be variable from chassis to chassis as a balancing feature.

[Quardak]

AND if you specalize on 1 WeaponType you have fewer Nodes then a Player that splitts Weapons.

->Avoid Boating single Weapons as State-of-the-Art

[RudWolf]

Well the skill tree is quite a step in good direction, but I can see few improvements worth of consideration. There is a lot to learn from RPG games in this manner.

Simplify offensive trees:

At this moment there too many trees in offensive section. I would suggest lowering the overall number of Skill points (to let say 50) and merge skill trees. I think there does not have to be a separate skill tree for each autocanon type, but one tree for all of them.

Thinking behind mech specialization would be more straightforward in a way: do I want to improve offensive, defensive, mobility or support? With correctly adjusted number of maximum SP vs. available nodes to be about 1/3, there would be more initiative for more conscious choices. Also lowering the actual amount of maximum SP and number of choices would make whole skilling proces much more clearer and synoptic.

Add synergy:

To prevent overspecialization in one weapon type and to support diversity, add synergical effects between different weapon trees. For example, divide (mentally) each weapon tree in to tiers, with low tiers giving bonuses to other weapon types and high tiers giving more bonuses to given type. In this way low leveling more weapon types will yield similar benefits as specializing in one type. Given that total SP count will be low, investing high in more than two weapon types would yield lot of offense but will mean serious hindrance in other domains.

Good example of skill synergy system can be found in Diablo 2 - when it was introduced, it totally rejuvenated character development and made it much more fun.

Pay for nodes only once:

There is a lot of debate about skill pricing. I don't see a big problem in paying 9m c-bills for full skill tree, but I don't think that respecing should cost you the all the c-bills again. Once a SP was purchased, it is purchased and it will stay on the mech (even if not assigned to node). Then you can get rid of this silly refund mechanic. There could be only small fee for unspecing a node (10k c-bills / 1MC) and the SP will return to mech's pool.

Make base quirks skill tree bonuses:

I am not 100% sure about this but what about moving the base quirks of given variant to skill tree in form of a bonus to respective nodes. For example if a variant has +10% structure why not to give add this bonus to all +structure nodes? With this one I see a benefit that all old quirks can disappear, but it can hinder the variability, because those bonuses will make players to prefer those nodes over others. Take this one just as idea.




Unfortunately, being game dev myself and seeing recent design fails (i.e ED), I have concern about the design team at PGI to be overly technical and lacking abstract analytical skills (its not easy, I know). Guys, seriously, have look at RPG games, don't reinvent the wheel if you cant so and hire experienced RPG game designer, it will pay off tremendously.

Edited by RudWolf, 11 February 2017 - 08:26 AM.

[Chound]

Vidarion, on 10 February 2017 - 10:18 AM, said:

With respect to:


This is sort of the point of the skill tree. It's forcing variety into the game. The 'meta' is being changed. Right now, you grind away for XP and everyone is able to unlock Radar Dep and then it's a module to drop into the mech to get it. There's no impact to spending your XP on RD vs other things and so everyone basically runs the same module set and (to some extent) weapon loadout. The skill tree implementation changes that meta. People will be able to make choices that better reflect their play style (reduced heat gen, faster cooldown, reduced duration for vomit builds; etc). So yes, there are things that people will say "I want X but I don't want to spend all the points on Y and Z to get there".

And that's good.

Same with speed tweak. 'Everyone will need / want ST'. Yep. But do you really need it? Or is it just a 'oh, I need speed tweak to finish eliting the chassis'? Yeah, speed tweak is nice but right now it's just "because it's there to complete the Elite skills". Mechs run perfectly fine without it. It's not a game changer.

not alll the T1 T2 guys would want the speed twqeak depending on the mech. brawlers are for o-10 ft away. They would need cool downs and reduced heat generation. a sniper would want long range quirks. I know alll my mechs will have advanced zoom. only problemis I don't have that much room for weapon skills like range velocity and cooldown.

[ArmageddonKnight]

Update:

So im thinking PGI need to address the high alpha meta, and this new skill system is the perfect opportunity.
With the smaller CD bonuses people r going to rely even more so on alpha striking, as such, a way to reduce alpha damage without stoping people from chucking on loads of weapons would be the following.

Remove heat containment from the bonus list. This will lower heat capacity, from a possible 48 back down to the standard 40.

In its place....

Ether:

Buff 'Cool Run' by 50%
or
In place of 'Heat Containment' have a bonus that adds the same as 'Cool Run' BUT with a negative effect of -3% heat capacity per skill.

The latter idea would result in Double Cool Run bonus with - 15% heat capacity lowering the standard 40 down to 34.

The effect ?
A reduction in the amount of damage that can be fired in 1 shot (alpha) but an increase in stagered fire for those who choose the additional cooling efficency skill. This would promote more balanced builds and allow players to stop being insta killed by multiple high damage alpha strikes.

Edited by ArmageddonKnight, 11 February 2017 - 06:55 PM.

[Currant]

Hotthedd, on 11 February 2017 - 05:36 AM, said:

@Knighthawk26: I think the price in C-bills is about right. First, the game NEEDS C-bill sinks. Second, there is no need to have 100+ fully mastered 'mechs. It goes against the entire BTU. The only way I could be pro-Pokemech is if there were associated costs with maintenance, travel, repair, and re-arm, like there is in the BTU.

Coming from the perspective of a new player, or in my case, a broke returning player that burned out in beta; the C-bill cost is outrageous. The cost of taking a stock mech and changing out weapons and equipment is already expensive enough (god help you if you want to replace the engine) but now I will also have to dump a resource that I am already short on into making my mechs not be nearly useless. If skill points are suppose to be a C-bill sink, it is a bad one. This kind of dark alley mugging isn't going to get fresh blood in the game, or keep them long. And the general impression I get from old blood is that their desire to play is tenuous.

As for maintenance costs, ammo restocking, etc; that is an even worse idea. Maybe I am a super scrub for not being able to rake in buckets of C-bills for something like this changes to be a good idea, but if this game is to survive, it needs new players and you don't get or keep them by bilking them.

[Hotthedd]

Currant, on 12 February 2017 - 12:35 AM, said:

Coming from the perspective of a new player, or in my case, a broke returning player that burned out in beta; the C-bill cost is outrageous. The cost of taking a stock mech and changing out weapons and equipment is already expensive enough (god help you if you want to replace the engine) but now I will also have to dump a resource that I am already short on into making my mechs not be nearly useless. If skill points are suppose to be a C-bill sink, it is a bad one. This kind of dark alley mugging isn't going to get fresh blood in the game, or keep them long. And the general impression I get from old blood is that their desire to play is tenuous.

As for maintenance costs, ammo restocking, etc; that is an even worse idea. Maybe I am a super scrub for not being able to rake in buckets of C-bills for something like this changes to be a good idea, but if this game is to survive, it needs new players and you don't get or keep them by bilking them.

I respectfully disagree.

You seem to think that the only way to be able to play is with everything maxxed out. It isn't. (At least for a 100% free-to-play player)
The choice is: Spend money to get a chassis mastered, or spend time to get a chassis mastered.
The game needs both kinds of players.

There should be a reward for either spending money on the game, or spending time playing the game. If leveling a 'mech is too trivial, then the only keeping players is to play Pokemech.

As for maintenance costs, it could only apply to mechs after your 12th one. (You would get a "free" Union dropship for movement) After 12 'mechs, you would have to pay to keep them stored, moved, etc.
...You could even do things like making maintenance free for loyalists...
Re-Arm and repair should never have been removed from the game, as poorly implemented as it was. But again, the way to address that could be to make it free for loyalists.

Bottom line: it is about immersion. Things cost money. Keeping things repaired and stored costs money.

[Znail]

So, collecting mechs are bad you say. So we should stop buying any mech packs, mech bay or hero mechs then? What will keep the servers running then?

So not only does this keep new players away. but it also makes it so that old players wont have any reason to spend money on the game either as the rest of this games life can be spent on maxing the mechs we already have, so no need to pay for anything new.

Note that a 50% reduction of the cost is not enough to fix this issue. 90% seems about right. I guess they made a decimal error or something.

[Hotthedd]

Znail, on 13 February 2017 - 07:26 AM, said:

So, collecting mechs are bad you say. So we should stop buying any mech packs, mech bay or hero mechs then? What will keep the servers running then?

So not only does this keep new players away. but it also makes it so that old players wont have any reason to spend money on the game either as the rest of this games life can be spent on maxing the mechs we already have, so no need to pay for anything new.

Note that a 50% reduction of the cost is not enough to fix this issue. 90% seems about right. I guess they made a decimal error or something.

I didn't say collecting 'mechs was bad, I said there should (as in the real world) be maintenance and transport fees associated with it.
Pokemech is not MechWarrior, Pokemech is not Battletech. Pokemech is Pokemech.

Buy all the 'mechs you want. Just don't expect to master them all for limited effort and expense.