0
after having read most of the criticism of the current system I want to propose my own idea on how to improve the skill system. The most important design decision to me must be
"Meaningful choices", because only those make the game fun and interesting by proposing Mech diversity on the battlefield and giving each Mech a purpose and a perspective.
Make those choices available to players by limiting access to certain trees for certain variants. Pick a variant to have two or three designated roles to fulfill and design trees fitting those choices. Allow one or two "common" trees, that all Mechs can spend points on, like a "Consumable support" tree or a "General mobility" tree.
E.g. a Raven-3L could have the designated roles "Sniper"
and "Scout". A player would have to choose either of one but could not have both role trees. An Archer-T could have "LR Missile Support" or "SR Missile Support". Be creative with the possible trees here and do not be afraid to have wrong roles - you can correct those later. If you feel very generous, have some Mech variants with three trees to choose from - those variants could be "generalists".The depth of the tree would be limited by the variant, so a Kodiak-3 and an Orion-P could e.g. both have access to the "Brawler" tree, but the Kodiak-3 can only unlock 10 Nodes in it while the Orion-P can unlock all 25 Nodes.
Limit access to Skill Points with Mech Tier, Weight, IS/Clan and individual Mech bonuses.
Lights: 50 Points
Meds: 40 Points
Hvy: 30 Points
Assault: 20 Points
Tier 5: +25 Points
Tier 4: +20 Points
Tier 3: +15 Points
Tier 2: +10 Points
Tier 1: +5 Points
IS: +10 Points
Clan: +5 Points
Individual bonuses include e.g.
Low Arm Hardpoints: +5 Points
Wide Torso: +5 Points
Very tall: +5 Points
Balance bonus: (various Points possible to balance out shortcomings of this variant).
E.g. a Kodiak-3 (Assault, Tier 1, Clan, no specials) would have a total of 30 Skill Points while a Awesome-8V (Assault, Tier 5, IS, Wide Torso) would have 60 Skill Points.
To further promote skill diversity, drop the c-bill costs from the skill system because c-bills are for buying Mechs. Refund only half the module prices and allow the players to spend their refunded money to buy lots of new Mechs to experiment and play with, thus having much more fun and spending lots of MC to buy Mechbays.
As an added bonus, have a 30-day-Happy-New-Mechs-In-Your-Hangar-Colour-And-Pattern-Sale.
Everyone would be happy - us the players for having meaningful and interesting choices to experiment with and you because we stay, have fun and spend money on MWO
Everybody wins!
o7
P.S.: If you have a very creative designer, surprise your players by rolling out the new system with new skills, that are interesting to try out. E.g. new consumables "Defensive fog" (5-6 smokes limit sight for some seconds), "Aerospace fighter friend" (much faster and powerful airstrikes that can be taken in both consumable slots), "Dropship emergency call" (Green smoke calls a Dropship to hover and give fire support for a few seconds) and so on.
Who would not love to try those out?
Edited by Warchild Corsair, 10 February 2017 - 01:18 PM.
