1 reply to this topic

[Cy Mitchell]

OK, I am just a few hours into evaluating the new Skill Tree and want to post a few of my initial thoughts.

At first, I found all the information in the PTS notes and in the tree itself to be overwhelming. It is not what I expected. I was really looking forward to it but right now the enthusiasm is squelched.

My concerns at this point:

-This is my biggest concern. With every Mech able to get 91 Skill Points, Mechs that need no quirks to be top tier under the present system are able to get extensive quirks under the new system and become even more powerful. This will lead to increased use for these Mechs and also will reduce TTK because they will be stronger now. The Kodiak KDK-3 is the most obvious example but you can add the Marauder IIC, Nyte Gyr, TimberWolf, Hunchback IIC, Arctic Cheetah and others to the list. This is going to destroy balance and diversity if the Skill Tree is left in its present state. I had hoped that the new Skill Tree would reduce and control power creep. It seems it will do just the opposite and widen the gap between the top and bottom performers.

I expected the Skill Tree to be a tool to achieve better balance in the game. My first impression is that it will worsen balance unless top tier Mechs receive less Skill Points than less optimized Mechs.

-As many others have mentioned, the new system does seem to encourage single weapon type builds which will result in less, not more, build diversity. This was a complaint that many leveled against the Energy Draw system when it was tested in PTS. IMO, the Skill Tree will have even more of an impact than ED would have.

There needs to be some sort of limit as to how many Skill Points can be invested in weapon systems. The present system limits you to a maximum of 3 modules that can enhance weapons. With most enhancement choices being either range or cooldown the norm is that only two weapon modules are used. The new Skill Tree allows you to invest in range, velocity, cooldown, jam chances, spread, reduced duration, heat reduction, etc. You can fine tune a single weapon type to a much greater degree than you can tow or three weapon systems. This favors boating ballistics, or lasers, or PPC or missiles, or Gauss. For example, the Kodiak KDK-3 can boat UACs. Focusing on just that one weapon system allows the player to invest in Velocity Increase, Range Increase, Cooldown Reduction, Jam Reduction and, in another tree, Magazine Capacity. So, now, you can enhance 4-5 weapon attributes. Mechs that cannot boat one weapon type due to hardpoint restrictions and types are left behind in the arms race due to choosing which weapon system to enhance. If they chosse to enhance all their weapon systems then they are giving up other attributes in the Defense, Mobility or other trees.

-As a result of having to choose less desirable Skill Nodes to get to desired nodes, I am finding that I cannot bring a Mech back to the same performance level as it was when it was Mastered under the present system for a comparable XP price. I am finding that I have to use a lot of GXP in addition to the HXP just to reach a comparable level of performance.

I would suggest decreasing the XP cost per node to 1000 XP from the current 1500 so that current players can at least bring their previously mastered Mechs back to the same level of performance without significantly more of a time investment. This would also benefit new players by keeping the grind time under control.

An alternative that I have seen suggested a couple of times is that less desirable nodes could be combined to get the full benefit thus making them more desirable and reducing the number of nodes that have to be invested in to match the current performance levels. For example, Hill Climb could be one node. The same applies to Speed Retention or Fall Damage. There are many other examples and reducing these less desirable nodes would save XP.

At this point, I have done limited actual testing with a few runs through Testing Grounds maps and a couple 4v4 games with a Mech with about 2/3 of the 91 skill points invested. I will add to my feedback as I put more time into testing but these are my initial impressions.

[Cy Mitchell]

OK, now I am a couple days into testing. I have leveled 4 Mechs and tested them in in Testing Grounds then tested the same Mechs in the Testing Ground on the live servers.

Difference seem to be that they all run a bit hotter and have a bit more armor which should increase the TTK. That is a plus for me.

My likes are:
The new hardened armor
The weapon trees
The ability to make choices
The layout of the Tree
The amount of work that has already been put into the Tree
The fact that we are testing and our feedback is being considered.
The fact that a new build is already being worked on and will be released soon to address some of the concerns

Dislikes:
The amount of unwanted skills that must be chosen to get the skills you want.

Major concerns:
Powerful Mechs that had no quirks with the old Skill system are being allowed to add quirks over and above what they need. Mechs like the Kodiak, Nyte Gyr, TimberWolf, Hunchback IIC and Arctic Cheetah are going to get more powerful and the gap to leser Mechs is going to widen and damage game balance.

Some weapon skills are too powerful. Skills like UAC Jam Reduction, UAC Velocity, erPPC Velocity and Gauss Velocity nodes give too much benefit. Mechs like a dakka KDK-3 are God powered under the new system as are Gauss/erPPC and multiple erPPC Mechs. Either skill points need to be restricted on Mechs that were top tier under the old system or node benefits need to be lowered. Examples for appropriate node levels would be:

Velocity nodes (all weapons) 2% per node
UAC Jam reduction 1% per node
Cooldown, Heat and Range values generally look good.

The other issue is some of the mobility quirks give by the nodes are too generous. For example:

Kinetic Burst and Turn rate nodes should be half the PTS values.
Kinetic Burst should be +5%
Turn Rate should be +3%

Last but not least, the cost per node is too high. 50K C-bills and 1000XP would be more reasonable. Either reduce prices on all the nodes or give players free nodes roughly equivalent to what they had in the old skill system and then raise the prices on Skill Nodes above that point.

The Skill Tree has a lot of potential. I am eagerly awaiting the new PTS build.