12 replies to this topic

[Haji1096]

FWIW,

I've played this game since 2012 and spent nearly 2000 dollars.

I joined a unit (BTD) in 2012 and have since played in:

2 seasons MCW

5 seasons MRBC

I'm am not the best player in the game but I have experience.

Here are my thoughts on the new skill system:

GENERAL

The new skill system:

-Punishes players who have mastered many mechs but transfer modules between mechs and do not have a gigantic c-bill bank

-Punishes people who want to experiment/optimize for different builds. -Punishes mechs which have more than one hard point type.

-Punishes new players who will undoubtedly need to respec because they don't understand which skills are important.

-Conclusions/Predictions-

-This tree does not make the in-game experience better. You are taking away something I already had making it more difficult, expensive and time-consuming to get back to what I originally had under the old system.

-Makes me feel pretty stupid for purchasing every package where I bought mechs with more than one type of weapon hard point, and not purchasing the mechs that are good for the meta.

-Players will leave the game because they will only be able to master a handful of the mechs they own... and won't be able to master mechs they had already mastered in the old system

-Players will play one weapon type heavies and assaults with high hard points, maybe play the best medium and best light in FW or in competitive tournaments.

COST

-Costs the same to spec out IS mechs as Clan mechs

-Cost the same to spec out a light, medium, heavy, and assault.

BALANCE

-Tree set up Promotes boating - The most efficient strategy to max one weapon tree, max defensive, max lower chassis, cherry pick sensor, and mech operations. -Arbitrary limitation on the number of skills for a "Mastered Mech". Why 91 points? -I did enjoy not having to search for modules....even though I'd rather have the flexibility of modules over the annoyance of finding them.

Tree Structure Commentary:

-What purpose does it serve to be forced into wasting skill points on skills that are basically useless or not wanted?

• 
  
  Players should not be forced into selecting skills that have limited use cases (i.e. bad) to get skills that are useful all the time (i.e. good):
  
• 
  
  Upper Chassis - Torso Speed -> Arm Pitch, Torso Pitch, Arm Speed -Torso Speed and Yaw are the only ones that matter, All the Arm skills are pointless. I skipped this tree but it would take 10 skill points to max Torso Speed, Torso Yaw, and Torso Pitch. Of these three Torso Speed is the most important skill.
  
• 
  
  Operations - A player must waste 9 skill points on Speed Retention, Hill Climb, Improved Gyros, and Quick Ignition to max Cool Run, Heat Containment
  
• 
  
  Mobility Lower Chassis - Every single one of these skills will be selected for every mech.
  
• 
  
  Defensive Tree - To maximize Armor Hardening / Skeletal Structure I am forced into Fall Damage or AMS Overload. A player must waste 4 skill points to max Skeletal Density and Armor Hardening
  
• 
  
  Sensor Tree - Utility of Radar Deprivation and Seismic Sensor are far superior to Target Decay, Retention, and Sensor Range. A player must waste 13 wasted skill points on bad skills to max Rader Dep and Seismic Sensor
  
• 
  
  Weapon Skills - Weapon Cooldown skill percentage too low.
  
• 
  
  Jump Jet skill tree - Useless compared to any other trees
  
• 
  
  Auxiliary Tree - UAV Skills should not be a requirement for Enhanced Narc or Capture Assist. Additionally, skills are useless. If a player nerfs himself and decides to run a narc build why is he forced to waste skill points on UAV related skills?
  
• 
  
  According to my (subjective) evaluation of the skills in each tree I waste 26 skill points on nodes I do not want (Speed Retention, Hill Climb, Improved Gyros, Quick Ignition, Target Decay, Target Retention, Sensor Range, Fall Damage) to maximize skills that I desire: (Cool Run, Heat Containment, Skeletal Density, Armor Hardening, Radar Deprivation, Seismic Sensor). Thus giving 91 skill points per mastered mech feels contrived. 28% of the points are not useful, plus I need C-bills to unlock each node...which I won't have enough of once the change is implemented to master all my mechs that I've already mastered.....You're ******* me for my loyalty and my collectionist playstyle.

Do you all even play your own game?

Edited by Haji1096, 10 February 2017 - 05:13 PM.

[Gas Guzzler]

Pretty hard to refute anything here...

It really makes you stop and think.. I bought so many mechs with real money, meaning I practically never buy mechs for C-bills, and I STILL will have most of my mechs un-skilled.

[Paigan]

I would really like to object here and say "come on, give them a chance" blabla. But, uhm, I can't.

What I see from my own PTS experience (or even the skilltree screenshots alone) is:
- My already pretty good MADIIC and WHK-C Laser Vomit boats (to the point of being called a hacker) will get incredibly buffed. They are cooler, more agile, better protected and maintain comparable dps and range. I assume KDK-3 will be beyond ridiculous.
- By boating lasers, I can max out almost all desireable skills. No tradeoff whatsoever to speak of. I'll spec my Mechs once and that will be it.

While I'm personally looking forward to all the fun I will have, objectively seen, these two points alone prove that the skill tree must be a pretty big failure.

The idea is good in principle. I (playing purely clan) even like that IS Mechs get bigger bonusses than Clan Mechs. Fits my perspective of: IS Mechs being crappy, but more flexible / tinkerable.

I would suggest that PGI looks at some other games skill trees. Their trade-offs, their balance.
And of course think their concept through with a little reason.

Edited by Paigan, 10 February 2017 - 04:41 PM.

[Fox2232]

I'll just pick two of your issues and ask you two things:
-Punishes mechs which have more than one hard point type.

-Punishes new players who will undoubtedly need to respec because they don't understand which skills are important.

Are benefits from weapon tree so game breakingly powerful that they encourage boating more than previous Quirks? (I did notice so many people cry that their weapon boosts now are weaker than their mechs had before.)

Does it really punish new players? Or anyone who does not understand and who does not do research before picking nodes?
(I am pretty sure some veteran players fall into later category, and even then they'll not be punished by respec cost as they'll believe that investment in those wrong nodes was best they could have done.)

Now I'll be evil:
-Makes me feel pretty stupid for purchasing every package where I bought mechs with more than one type of weapon hard point, and not purchasing the mechs that are good for the meta.
This statement of yours is what should really make you feel that way.

-Players will leave the game because they will only be able to master a handful of the mechs they own... and won't be able to master mechs they had already mastered in the old system
If I have 200 mechs and in new system I'll have initial C-Bills to master 50 most enjoyable ones. How do I get C-Bills for the rest?
Will it be by playing those 50 fully Mastered ones?
Or will I be dumb and play those 150 un-Mastered, one by one till I master them? (suffering all the way)

-Players will play one weapon type heavies and assaults with high hard points, maybe play the best medium and best light in FW or in competitive tournaments.
That remains to be seen as those boats will realize that some "noob" with mixed weaponry obliterated them.

-Costs the same to spec out IS mechs as Clan mechs
Yes, it does, and yet it is IS who gets higher % benefits from some nodes.

-Cost the same to spec out a light, medium, heavy, and assault.
Sure, and Lighter mechs have higher % benefits to effects of some nodes.
= = = =
But, not to be jerk. You have some pretty realistic and creative criticism to trees at lower part of OP.

[Haji1096]

I probably came off a bit harsh in my original post.

Let me explain.

I have put time and money into the game, even attempted to add hopefully something positive into the community to whatever extent I can.

I realize I am critiquing someone's hard work.

But this idea is just one of many in a long line (minimap change, energy draw) that seem aimless and do not accomplish the original intent of creating a new skill system in the first place.

This begs the question: are the publically stated design goals for new skill tree the same as the internal design goals for the new skill tree ?

I used to be more positive (a white knight) about the direction of this game.

[Haji1096]

Fox2232, on 10 February 2017 - 05:03 PM, said:

I'll just pick two of your issues and ask you two things:
-Punishes mechs which have more than one hard point type.

-Punishes new players who will undoubtedly need to respec because they don't understand which skills are important.

Are benefits from weapon tree so game breakingly powerful that they encourage boating more than previous Quirks? (I did notice so many people cry that their weapon boosts now are weaker than their mechs had before.)

Does it really punish new players? Or anyone who does not understand and who does not do research before picking nodes?
(I am pretty sure some veteran players fall into later category, and even then they'll not be punished by respec cost as they'll believe that investment in those wrong nodes was best they could have done.)

Now I'll be evil:
-Makes me feel pretty stupid for purchasing every package where I bought mechs with more than one type of weapon hard point, and not purchasing the mechs that are good for the meta.
This statement of yours is what should really make you feel that way.

-Players will leave the game because they will only be able to master a handful of the mechs they own... and won't be able to master mechs they had already mastered in the old system
If I have 200 mechs and in new system I'll have initial C-Bills to master 50 most enjoyable ones. How do I get C-Bills for the rest?
Will it be by playing those 50 fully Mastered ones?
Or will I be dumb and play those 150 un-Mastered, one by one till I master them? (suffering all the way)

-Players will play one weapon type heavies and assaults with high hard points, maybe play the best medium and best light in FW or in competitive tournaments.
That remains to be seen as those boats will realize that some "noob" with mixed weaponry obliterated them.

-Costs the same to spec out IS mechs as Clan mechs
Yes, it does, and yet it is IS who gets higher % benefits from some nodes.

-Cost the same to spec out a light, medium, heavy, and assault.
Sure, and Lighter mechs have higher % benefits to effects of some nodes.
= = = =
But, not to be jerk. You have some pretty realistic and creative criticism to trees at lower part of OP.

Your criticisms are fair and warranted. I posted to provoke discussion, not to be the sole arbiter of what is objectively right.

I'm an engineer and have played this game for a long time. So I made four attempts at utilizing the skill tree to get the most powerful mech possible given the resources allotted. No doubt, I probably made a few mistakes and there are probably edge cases where certain trees may be more powerful in specific situation or game mode, but I can almost guarantee that players will take the approach I have laid out to skill up their mechs.

[Fox2232]

Haji1096, on 10 February 2017 - 05:06 PM, said:

I probably came off a bit harsh in my original post.

Let me explain.

I have put time and money into the game, even attempted to add hopefully something positive into the community to whatever extent I can.

I realize I am critiquing someone's hard work.

But this idea is just one of many in a long line (minimap change, energy draw) that seem aimless and do not accomplish the original intent of creating a new skill system in the first place.

This begs the question: are the publically stated design goals for new skill tree the same as the internal design goals for the new skill tree ?

I used to be more positive (a white knight) about the direction of this game.

Probably yes, but their designers of game mechanics lack skill/knowledge, to do it properly.
There are great many flaws. And some Total flops.

But if they really go through all the trash we make in this forum. Put relevant things on whiteboard and look for all those solutions we proposed to each, on Monday.
They'll pick and adjust design of all that needs to be adjusted by next Tuesday.
Implementation and PTS deployment can be done by Friday. And next wave of weekend testing can be much more positive than this one.

[WolvesX]

I hate to do it, but I sadly have to agree...

I'm a fan of the new system, but PGI can't just **** olf vets.

I'm a 2012 vet too, but I can understand why people hate the new stuff.

[FireStoat]

The percentage of skill picks that are forced upon you while on the path of selecting the ones you do want is unacceptable. There was zero(0) thought put into it, and yes, I will use the arm speed skill selections being forced upon players that are improving a mech with no lower actuators as an example.

The grand claim that 91 skill point choices is almost OP for the end result of a mech's power needs to squarely face the fact that close to 20% or more of the skills that were purchased were never wanted at all, do little to help the mech, but had to be paid for at 1 million each by the player, per mech.

[jonfett]

This skill tree is further proof that PGI has little to no idea what they are doing. How many months did they spend coming up with this hot mess?! It's shades of Marine Sharpshooter all over again...

[Skribs]

I've got about half my mechs with real money and I don't even have them all configured enough to drop, let alone with modules.

The costs here and balance issues will make me quit and never buy a mech again.

[S Phoenix]

Quote

-Punishes players who have mastered many mechs but transfer modules between mechs and do not have a gigantic c-bill bank

Indeed - This is going to hurt me for sure real bad!

349 Mechs + 25 Duplicate Mechs All Mastered

I will ONLY end up with:

48 Mechs +12 Duplicate Mechs Mastered
(This is looking at Mechs that will have 136,500 XP readily available):

The rest will get Mech XP worth 38 Skill Points (+ Any extra XP above Mastered which is less than 136,500 XP)


Don't get me wrong, I like the idea of the Tree, but it needs some adjustments real bad...

Some things I have noted right off (Apologies/correct me if I'm getting this wrong):

Weapon Cooldown
Current Tree System Gives -5% with -12% using a cooldown module ---> Total -17% Cooldown
New Tree System Gives Max -5% (IS), -4% (Clan)


Heat Containment
Current Tree System Gives 20%
New Tree System Gives Max 15%


Cool Run
Current Tree System Gives 15%
New Tree System Gives Max 10%


Pinpoint (Weapon convergence)
Missing in New Tree System
Not sure if this actually works today in the game anyway...


Solution:

Compensate Mastered Mechs with the number of Skill Points that would allow them to return to the same performance as they were with the previous tree. (To compensate for Performance from the old tree)
+ Give 5 Skill Points for every legacy Module Slot removed from the Mech (To compensate for Module Slots)

OR

At the time of the patch, Pre-Unlock those skills (Heat containment etc..) in the New Tree that were unlocked in the old tree - one time unlock (To compensate for Performance from the old tree)
+ Give 5 Skill Points for every legacy Module Slot removed from the Mech (To compensate for Module Slots)

NOTE: The total may end up less than the 91 Skill Points - but at least return the Mastered Mechs to their previous (Skill Tree + Module) Performance

Please be fair to those who have spent the time on the old tree (& money)
Total money Spent (~$2000), Total time Spent (~4 Years - playing almost every day 4 hours min)

Edited by Samurai Phoenix, 10 February 2017 - 09:02 PM.

[Jagd Wolf]

Greetings:
I started playing MWO in June 2016 and I currently have over 100 mechs. Most of them are mastered.
A few thoughts came to mind after playing the PTS:

Between the old system and the new I would agree that they were similar if all of our historical XP points were simply dumped into a single GXP pool.

Once you've mastered a mech – shouldn’t players be able to move skill points at will without additional cost? This would be closer to the old way of moving your modules around.

Is it possible to have a base level skill tree for one type of mech – say a Mad Dog - that affects all Mad Dogs? From there, secondary and tertiary tiers skill points can unlock mechs to individually specialize. This would effectively reduce skill points required while at the same time encourage people to have variants and/or multiple instances of the same mech.

The skill tree needs to be freed up a little more. For instance; I’ve never found use for some features like hill climb. I also appreciate the conundrum of players being able to cherry pick prime skill nodes.

I'm not sure that this new skill tree will encourage people to buy mech packs. Why buy a mech pack for a base cost of 20$ with three variants only to sink an additional 27 million cbills - not to mention additional millions to respec. Is it possible to have as part of the purchase some skill tree points unlocked?