16 replies to this topic

[Wibbledtodeath]

The mistake you made was putting this on the PTS.

Again we will get a wave of conservative negativism from a portion of the community who are chronic complainants about any change

And if history is anything to go by, then this substantial improvement over the old skill tree system will be scrapped before it gets to go live.

Please don't let that happen PGI. No system is perfect, but this IS BETTER. Listen to the positive criticism and not the negative conservatism, make alterations that are deeply and widely felt to improve the new system (so far reducing cost for respec seems to be a theme), don't scrap the substantial work that has gone into this as you did with power draw.

I look forward to seeing this go live.

Thanks for your efforts.

......end of rant.

[Whiskey Dharma]

They're adults, and they asked for feedback.

[Gas Guzzler]

Lol. You can't just discredit negative feedback and say its only from "a portion of the community who are chronic complainants about any change". Who do you think you are exactly?

Thinks can't get changed for the better without negative feedback.

"Like Energy Draw"... Energy Draw was a hopeless dumpster fire. The skill tree can be redeemed but it needs some work.

[Acehilator]

You have a strange definition of "substantial improvement". In the best foreseeable outcome, the system will do what the old one did, just differently. And screw over lots of people (new players and players with many mechs) in the process. Wheee.

Build diversity, what a pipedream.

/edit: corrected mistake

Edited by Acehilator, 10 February 2017 - 03:55 PM.

[Dee Eight]

Whiskey Dharma, on 10 February 2017 - 03:52 PM, said:

They're adults, and they asked for feedback.

yes...but they expected adult feedback in return...not spoiled children feedback.

[Monkey Lover]

Looks to me they needed another month to get some of the balancing down. They rushed this to pts again . Should have just told us to wait.

[MechaBattler]

There is something to be said that there are people who don't want the game to change. They want to keep things at their current level. Anything that lowers the bar on mech performance or weapon performance gets flak. And that's just natural though. People are enjoying the current version of the game. Can't expect everyone to be okay with a sweeping change. Especially if it effects how the game plays and adds more grind to an already grindy game.

Just because people are criticizing it doesn't mean it should be abandoned. It has potential. But they have to be willing to listen to the most glaring issues that people agree on. Then make common sense decisions on how to tweak it. Then release a new build. Get feedback again.

Tweak, release build, feedback. And so on. When I'm cutting parts to spec, I don't just jack the numbers up and see what happens. If you want it as close as possible you have to bring closer and closer to perfect.

[Deathlike]

Dee Eight, on 10 February 2017 - 04:00 PM, said:

yes...but they expected adult feedback in return...not spoiled children feedback.

So, all negative feedback is childish?

You know, if you hold a room full of yes-men that aren't willing to challenge or criticize decisions being made... it shouldn't surprise anyone that the business fails due to "not being in touch with reality".

For a business to thrive, it has to acknowledge the bad with the good and to ignore it is not good for the business for the long term.

But hey, let's just ignore all criticism and assume everything is spot on perfect right?

[Ori Disciple]

You can't just throw something untested onto a live server. It's shortsided, as well as a bad move. It's not hard to look beyond the mindless bitching/praising, and actually look at proper critique. If they can't stand any criticism, they should be making a game in the first place.

[Cy Mitchell]

I am usually an advocate for change but change has to make the game better, or at least not worse. There are valid reasons why some things need to be changed before it gets released. The Skill Tree has a lot of potential but if it got released in its current state then it would make the game worse.

I do not consider the majority of the feeback that I have seen "negative feedback". Most of it I would call constructive criticism which is positive feedback. You always have a few that want to rant, hate and make zero sense. Those types almost never offer anything constructive to the discussion and are better left ignored. For the most part, people are being civil, offering ideas for improvements and taking the time to actually try out the system so they can evaluate it intelligently. I would say that is exactly how a PTS is supposed to work.

Edited by Rampage, 10 February 2017 - 05:11 PM.

[GabrielSun]

My complaints are not about the change, but the haphazard way the trees are set up which excel at wasting points and money. You are literally forced to spend cbills and a portion of already restricted points on things you never have used and would never purchase anyway to get the things you do want.

[cazidin]

Yes. PGI made a very stupid decision in letting us, the playerbase, tell them how to fix their game because they quite literally do not know how and have very kindly asked us "Would you tell us if this is OK because we really need you to buy MechPacks or we go out of business."

No. They should've shoved this on the Live Servers, in a broken state, be universally hated by everyone both for doing that and the system they've created, then hastily rush out a fix while saying "Oh, uh, we totally knew about this. We'll fix it ASAP in a Hotfix." and then promise further changes in a later patch that never comes.

PGI would never do this.

Ever.

And not without warning.

Like they did with the mini-map.

Which they never did.

[Alan Davion]

Wibbledtodeath, on 10 February 2017 - 03:47 PM, said:

The mistake you made was putting this on the PTS.

Again we will get a wave of conservative negativism from a portion of the community who are chronic complainants about any change

Pretty much the best way I can describe some of the things PGI does is basically...

Change for the sake of change.

Or, in layman's terms...

Throwing all the shite against the wall and seeing what sticks.

That's just poor game design no matter how you slice it, and that's pretty much what PGI has done every time they try and make a change to the game.

So when people complain about something PGI is doing to change the game, it's for a god damned good reason.

Wibbledtodeath, on 10 February 2017 - 03:47 PM, said:

And if history is anything to go by, then this substantial improvement over the old skill tree system will be scrapped before it gets to go live.

Please don't let that happen PGI. No system is perfect, but this IS BETTER. Listen to the positive criticism and not the negative conservatism, make alterations that are deeply and widely felt to improve the new system (so far reducing cost for respec seems to be a theme), don't scrap the substantial work that has gone into this as you did with power draw.

Now, I will agree that PARTS of the new skill system are better than what we have right now, but jesus h. christ does the rest of it need a lot of work.

Specifically, the parts where pretty much everyone maxes out defense, lower chassis mobility, and then some support tree or the other, and then spending whatever is left over on whatever single weapon tree best suits the specific mech they're building, which only serves to further enforce the boating meta that the game suffers from.

Either there should be a crap-ton more skill trees, or the skill trees we have should be a lot longer to force more specialization instead of the generalization of the trifecta of must-have skill trees as I outlined before.

If this "Hot Radioactive Mess" as the good Bishop Steiner so eloquently put it, goes to the live server in its current form it will be an unmitigated disaster for the game as a whole, as it would more that likely drive off even more of the casual players who are starved for C-Bills, and only the super-comp-god-tier players who have been around since day 1, grinding daily for as many C-Bills as they could hoard will be able to afford to play under the new system.

That's also why the previous PTS for Energy Draw and Info War never made it to the live server, they were good ideas implemented extremely poorly, although the Info War PTS was far worse than the Skill Tree system for a whole series of reasons.

Yes, the Skill Tree has the potential to do a lot to fix the game, but only if PGI listens to the negative feedback on several of the systems in the Skill Tree system.

The non-linear skill trees and the absurd C-Bill cost being the top two problems the Skill Tree system has.

The upper chassis mobility tree is, from what I've gathered, largely ignored by many people because some mechs simply do not have arm mounts for weapons, and they force you to waste points on arm skills in order to get at the actual torso skills they need for that specific mech.

Make some of these skill trees more linear, reduce the C-Bill cost by AT LEAST half, or eliminate it altogether and you will have fixed the two biggest problems the system has.

After that, look into either increasing the length of some of the skill trees, or add more skill trees to force more choice and specialization.

[Pjwned]

Dee Eight, on 10 February 2017 - 04:00 PM, said:

yes...but they expected adult feedback in return...not spoiled children feedback.

My bad, I guess I have to lower my standards to be complete garbage before giving feedback.

We only need to grind 9.1m c-bills and 136k XP to master a single mech, but that's not enough grinding so let's multiply it by a factor of 10 because all grinding is good.

Great idea, right?

[Y E O N N E]

This is the kind of thread that the creator doesn't return to because he enjoys plugging his ears and thinking he's so smart and special.

[Wibbledtodeath]

So so true Yeonne. Thanks for that insightful contribution.

(at least you comprehended the "end of rant" bit in the OP)


edited for clarification.

Edited by Wibbledtodeath, 10 February 2017 - 10:33 PM.

[Y E O N N E]

Wibbledtodeath, on 10 February 2017 - 09:11 PM, said:

So so true Yeonne. Thanks for that insightful contribution.

And the same creator cannot resist the opportunity to come in and say otherwise when it's pointed out...

Consider yourself played!