25 replies to this topic

[reflectorjones]

I have around 100 mechs mastered, likely slightly less. My math tells me that it is going to cost me $9,100,000 per mech, total of $910,000,000 cbills to respec them. I have 40 million cbills (and I struggle to maintain this much), with maybe 50 million in modules.

If my module refund is $50M, and I have $40M = $90M, where are the rest of the $820,000,000 cbills going to come from to spec my currently mastered mechs? I earn on average $127K per quick play match. Is PGI saying I need to play 6,456 matches to respec my mechs with speed tweak, radar derp, and weapons modules? That is well over 1,000 hours just to spec out my mechs the way they are now.

Can someone explain if I am missing something?

[Bud Crue]

Answer: THE GRIND!

They left that part out of the stated goals of the PTS: "to get the player base accustomed to a grind of which they have never seen the likes."

[Malcolm Vordermark]

You can't save them all, time to triage.

[cazidin]

And yet, PGI will very probably increase C-Bills earned in matches rather than address the problem with the skills costing too much.

[50 50]

Ye know nothing of grind.... not until you've payed LotRO

[NotSoDeadpool15]

reflectorjones, on 12 February 2017 - 06:55 PM, said:

I have around 100 mechs mastered, likely slightly less. My math tells me that it is going to cost me $9,100,000 per mech, total of $910,000,000 cbills to respec them. I have 40 million cbills (and I struggle to maintain this much), with maybe 50 million in modules.

If my module refund is $50M, and I have $40M = $90M, where are the rest of the $820,000,000 cbills going to come from to spec my currently mastered mechs? I earn on average $127K per quick play match. Is PGI saying I need to play 6,456 matches to respec my mechs with speed tweak, radar derp, and weapons modules? That is well over 1,000 hours just to spec out my mechs the way they are now.

Can someone explain if I am missing something?

Mastering a mech is different with the new skill tree a fully mastered mech in the current game only uses xp and variants in the PTS it adds in modules so when you say you don't have enough c-bills it would be like having maximum modules on every mech. This is seemingly over looked by a lot of the community but with the addition of the previous cost of max modules per mech being around 16 million c-bills the new system is a much smaller grind.

[WrathOfDeadguy]

NotSoDeadpool15, on 12 February 2017 - 09:13 PM, said:

Mastering a mech is different with the new skill tree a fully mastered mech in the current game only uses xp and variants in the PTS it adds in modules so when you say you don't have enough c-bills it would be like having maximum modules on every mech. This is seemingly over looked by a lot of the community but with the addition of the previous cost of max modules per mech being around 16 million c-bills the new system is a much smaller grind.

That is overlooked because it's irrelevant. PGI is adding a cbill cost to part of the chassis grind which does not cost cbills. The per 'Mech costs under the new system are cheaper if, and only if, you are in the habit of buying a full set of modules for each and every one of your 'Mechs. If you do that, bully for you. Not everyone is in the same boat. Not everyone even buys modules... and anyway, it's two different systems being integrated:

1. The current basic and elite tier skills, which represent acceptable performance for a 'Mech in quickplay. Purchase effectively mandatory. No cbill cost. Grind takes a leisurely weekend's playtime. Covers all 'Mechs of the same variant, no matter how many duplicates are owned.

2. A full load of 'Mech and weapon modules, which is not generally necessary outside competitive play. Purchase optional, and one set of modules can be used in multiple 'Mechs.

The costs for the latter are being frontloaded into the former, which makes those costs mandatory rather than optional. You can afford to run a 'Mech without cooldown+range mods, seismic, or derp. You cannot afford to drop in a 'Mech that does not have 2x basics and speed tweak- at least not for any longer than necessary to grind elites out. The performance gap between dealer-fresh and elited is too wide to call optional. Thus, the millions of cbills which were formerly an optional cost to optimize an already good chassis are rolled into the skills required to make a chassis viable in the first place. It is not the same thing.

Plus, it's a per 'Mech cost, not a "per however many modules I feel like buying" cost. Mandatory, instead of optional. The costs in both XP and cbills are also per 'Mech, not per variant, so if you have duplicates with different loadouts you have to pay to skill up each one individually.

The cost is not equal or lower, it is higher. It is only lower if you own no duplicate 'Mechs and have a full set of modules installed on every single 'Mech you own- and only in that one specific set of circumstances. If you own any duplicate 'Mechs, if you have even one 'Mech mastered which does not have a full set of modules, then the cbill cost under the new system is higher than under the current system.

Got it?

I'm in the same boat as OP- 112 'Mechs total. 1,019,200,000 cbills, of which ~50,000,000 will be paid with module refunds. That's roughly five percent.

I only kept enough of certain modules to outfit a single drop deck. I rarely drive more than 3-4 different 'Mechs each time I play, so I can mount the modules when I log in and remove them when I log off- which meant more cbills free for building those 112 'Mechs. That has never been a problem. My handful of seismics, derps, and weapon mods has been plenty.

Players should never be penalized for playing the game. If you bought a smaller number of 'Mechs and a larger number of modules... well, that's great for you, but PGI also built their game to allow players to buy lots of 'Mechs and only a few modules. Both were equally valid approaches, but one is now being rewarded while the other is being severely punished. If you have lots of modules, you might see one-for-one cbill costs here... but if you don't, then you'll see a re-grind several orders of magnitude greater than what you had to put in the first time around.

Skill tree, current iteration... that's a frankly untenable position for me to be in as far as the game is concerned. I would have to put almost as much additional time (or money) into this game as I already have, just in order to get back to where I am right this minute. I will effectively be punished for spending a bunch of real money with PGI to acquire a large number of 'Mechs, by having my accumulated progress with all of those 'Mechs removed and locked behind an additional grindwall. The effective value of the real money spent on the game devalues in inverse proportion to the percentage of increase in the required grind per 'Mech real money was paid for.

That is neither an intelligent nor a particularly ethical way to do business.

Edited by WrathOfDeadguy, 12 February 2017 - 10:05 PM.

[Talorien]

NotSoDeadpool15, on 12 February 2017 - 09:13 PM, said:

Mastering a mech is different with the new skill tree a fully mastered mech in the current game only uses xp and variants in the PTS it adds in modules so when you say you don't have enough c-bills it would be like having maximum modules on every mech. This is seemingly over looked by a lot of the community but with the addition of the previous cost of max modules per mech being around 16 million c-bills the new system is a much smaller grind.

This is untrue because:

1) You only have to grind a full set of modules for one Mech ONCE (say 18 million for R.Dep, Seismic, Weapon x2) to use them on other mechs of a similar build

2) To change from (say) a ML to a MPL build in the new system, you have to pay about 3 million per weapon type (respec + new unlock cost for skill nodes in weapon trees) EACH time. Under the old system you have to buy the new modules ONCE (6 million).

For (2), if you ever change you mind about loadout more than TWICE in your whole MWO play career, you are worse off in terms of CBills. This escalates astronomically (full respec cost for 91 skill nodes is 11.2 million CBills) if you ever do a single full respec.

I don't know about you, but I can easily change loadouts twice per weekend and must have changed weapons modules over a hundred times across my play career.

Put another way, the new system at current cost is like saying 'everytime you changed your weapons modules on a mech in the past, junk your old modules and buy new ones for $3-6 million CBills for that privilege, even if you already own the new modules.' That is just crazy!

Edited by Talorien, 12 February 2017 - 10:07 PM.

[LordLeto]

I'm with NotSo for the most part. People seem to be willfully ignoring that some of the costs are coming from rolling the modules into the skill tree. As well as the mechs in triplicate system used now. The extreme example being KDKs, that's 20 mil extra in mech costs(that you may or may not keep given you have 4 mech bays to start) and 18 mil in module cost to be to the point where 9.1 mil will get you in this system.

But y'all bring up valid points. The people with large mech bays are being punished in the current set up and the respec costs are punitive for new players and tinkerers. Both need to be addressed. Imo those are the more important points that need to be pushed. On alienates current loyal customers the other new and old ones.

New skill tree costs in mech exp and cbills is a bargain for a new player. But should probably be grandfathered into mechs currently mastered as to not punish those pokemech enthusiasts among us.

[NextGame]

I've come to the conclusion with the new skill tree, given that i have 550m cbills and over 300 mechs at the moment, is that the only way to win will be to uninstall.

[Fox2232]

reflectorjones, on 12 February 2017 - 06:55 PM, said:

I have around 100 mechs mastered, likely slightly less. My math tells me that it is going to cost me $9,100,000 per mech, total of $910,000,000 cbills to respec them. I have 40 million cbills (and I struggle to maintain this much), with maybe 50 million in modules.

If my module refund is $50M, and I have $40M = $90M, where are the rest of the $820,000,000 cbills going to come from to spec my currently mastered mechs? I earn on average $127K per quick play match. Is PGI saying I need to play 6,456 matches to respec my mechs with speed tweak, radar derp, and weapons modules? That is well over 1,000 hours just to spec out my mechs the way they are now.

Can someone explain if I am missing something?

Can you be more illustrative and deliver relevant data?
Number of Games You played:
Average C-Bill gain from match:
(It is just 2 Clicks away. >> Profile >> Stats)

[Leopardo]

nah - I bought a modules and can switch them okay . I can strip mechs....now I can't I must have all that modules on nodes and trees on every mech !....so I think that guys is completely right!!! need the solution for that issue

[JC Daxion]

reflectorjones, on 12 February 2017 - 06:55 PM, said:

I have around 100 mechs mastered, likely slightly less. My math tells me that it is going to cost me $9,100,000 per mech, total of $910,000,000 cbills to respec them. I have 40 million cbills (and I struggle to maintain this much), with maybe 50 million in modules.

If my module refund is $50M, and I have $40M = $90M, where are the rest of the $820,000,000 cbills going to come from to spec my currently mastered mechs? I earn on average $127K per quick play match. Is PGI saying I need to play 6,456 matches to respec my mechs with speed tweak, radar derp, and weapons modules? That is well over 1,000 hours just to spec out my mechs the way they are now.

Can someone explain if I am missing something?

and of those 100 mechs.. How many have you played more than 50-70 matches in? I too have around 100 mechs.. SO many i mastered yet, even just getting to master dont even have 40 matches in said mech.. I looked at all my mechs, and i think i counted about 15 that actually had more than 75 and a bunch of those were right around the 75 match mark.. aka 75-80 or so.. not even hitting 100 matches.. only a handful of them are in the 100+ range.. I have nearly 6k matches played and been playing for 4 years now..

So i have to ask.. Is mastering every single mech.. just to park in a garage really that big of a deal? Just not needing to buy 3 mechs on my clan account, i now have enough money to master close to the 8 mechs i actually play.. I'd rather buy the mech i want, and pay a bit extra to master it.. than spend the 100's of millions i spent on my IS account.. just to unlock master slots..

My IS account has grinded nearly a billion credits heck maybe more than a billion.. But i will tell you for sure that well over half of it was just buying chassis i don't even play!


something to think about..

Edited by JC Daxion, 13 February 2017 - 02:43 AM.

[Widowmaker1981]

Yes, this system is very harsh indeed to those that wanted to swap modules every. single. time. they changed mechs.

Im not really sure how you stomached doing that, especially while the save times were so utterly appallingly long until they fixed that a few months ago, but still...

They do have to strike a balance though. I have ~200 mechs, but not more than ~80 i care about at all, and i detested swapping modules with a massive passion, so im looking at ~2,500,000,000 refund on those. Once ive mastered the 80 or so mechs i care about again, im still going to have over 1.5 billion C-Bills.. and there are probably quite a few in my position - i assume PGI don't want to be putting too many people in the position im going to be in of never having to worry about ingame money again.

[reflectorjones]

Fox2232, on 13 February 2017 - 01:56 AM, said:

Can you be more illustrative and deliver relevant data?
Number of Games You played:
Average C-Bill gain from match:
(It is just 2 Clicks away. >> Profile >> Stats)

12,496 games and $127k per round average which is $1,586,992,000. Does this help?

[Kdogg788]

I thought PGI's business model was predicated on selling mechs and getting people to buy mech packs, not increasing the grind and implying that you should only run one mech of a chassis? This makes absolutely no financial sense on their part...

-k

[reflectorjones]

JC Daxion, on 13 February 2017 - 02:38 AM, said:

and of those 100 mechs.. How many have you played more than 50-70 matches in? I too have around 100 mechs.. SO many i mastered yet, even just getting to master dont even have 40 matches in said mech.. I looked at all my mechs, and i think i counted about 15 that actually had more than 75 and a bunch of those were right around the 75 match mark.. aka 75-80 or so.. not even hitting 100 matches.. only a handful of them are in the 100+ range.. I have nearly 6k matches played and been playing for 4 years now..

So i have to ask.. Is mastering every single mech.. just to park in a garage really that big of a deal? Just not needing to buy 3 mechs on my clan account, i now have enough money to master close to the 8 mechs i actually play.. I'd rather buy the mech i want, and pay a bit extra to master it.. than spend the 100's of millions i spent on my IS account.. just to unlock master slots..

My IS account has grinded nearly a billion credits heck maybe more than a billion.. But i will tell you for sure that well over half of it was just buying chassis i don't even play!


something to think about..

Most of these are mastered, some are new purchases and I am still working on. Why does the amount of time I play a mech matter anyway? If I master it and only want to take it out on a Sunday drive occasionally like an LRM Jaeger, there is even less reason to buy modules for it. I enjoy the Griffin 3M, but its situational, but I like the 2N more. Why is that reason for me to sell off my 3M?


Edit - Excel lost its format. Most of my mechs have over 50 rounds yes.

Edited by reflectorjones, 13 February 2017 - 05:48 AM.

[Bud Crue]

To all of you trying to justify the costs (be they cbills or XP) of the new system with reasoning along the lines of well I have lots of mechs and I don't care about most of them. Please consider a few things:

1) I assume you haven't been living in a hole and are aware of PGI's predilection for playing darts and changing what today is a great mech and turning it to crap and vice versa? Example I don't hardly ever play my Oxide anymore, but I do remember how spectacular PGI made it for a while...I also remember the Black Jack, the Black Knight, the Thunderbolt 5ss, etc. Consider that sort of thing before you dump all those mechs "you don't care about" in order to help fund squirting out those mechs that you do. After you give that idea some thought, now reaccess just how reasonably priced the new system really is, when you account for inevitable shifts in the game that not only force you into respect that you don't want, but to repurchase mechs you sold that the dartboard decides to make great again.

2) The whole "well this saves me the hassle of swapping modules" thing. Seriously? So spending an extra 10mil per mech in the new system is reasonable, but spending 30 seconds to swap modules isn't? Fine. Let me know how you feel about the 5-10 minutes of respec time and 2mil in costs in the new system every time you want to give a new load out a go.

3)Oh but "I won't respec" you say? You plan on just buying another mech to run the new meta of the week? Okay, back to costs, each mech is now x3 the current XP grind and you have to do it for EVERY mech; plus that 10Mil or so c-bill investment just in terms of the skill tree, again for every mech. That is a better deal how than the current system where the purchase of a second mech of the same variant is already fully leveled?

Edited by Bud Crue, 13 February 2017 - 05:49 AM.

[Doctor Dinosaur]

Just refund the skill points on resetting the skill tree. Keep the initial costs on buying the skill points.
This way skilling will still cost, but respeccing is free.

Don't see no reason to pay for every weapon change, too. PGI got rid of repair costs, now they are KIND OF introducing them again.

[reflectorjones]

Bud Crue, on 13 February 2017 - 05:48 AM, said:

To all of you trying to justify the costs (be they cbills or XP) of the new system with reasoning along the lines of well I have lots of mechs and I don't care about most of them. Please consider a few things:

1) I assume you haven't been living in a hole and are aware of PGI's predilection for playing darts and changing what today is a great mech and turning it to crap and vice versa? Example I don't hardly ever play my Oxide anymore, but I do remember how spectacular PGI made it for a while...I also remember the Black Jack, the Black Knight, the Thunderbolt 5ss, etc. Consider that sort of thing before you dump all those mechs "you don't care about" in order to help fund squirting out those mechs that you do. After you give that idea some thought, now reaccess just how reasonably priced the new system really is, when you account for inevitable shifts in the game that not only force you into respect that you don't want, but to repurchase mechs you sold that the dartboard decides to make great again.

2) The whole "well this saves me the hassle of swapping modules" thing. Seriously? So spending an extra 10mil per mech in the new system is reasonable, but spending 30 seconds to swap modules isn't? Fine. Let me know how you feel about the 5-10 minutes of respec time and 2mil in costs in the new system every time you want to give a new load out a go.

3)Oh but "I won't respec" you say? You plan on just buying another mech to run the new meta of the week? Okay, back to costs, each mech is now x3 the current XP grind and you have to do it for EVERY mech; plus that 10Mil or so c-bill investment just in terms of the skill tree, again for every mech. That is a better deal how than the current system where the purchase of a second mech of the same variant is already fully leveled?

Obviously the cheapest way to bypass this is to sink $5M into a 2nd of the same variant, $1.5M into doubles, $4-5M into another engine, then $9.1M into a new tree. DUH.

Edited by reflectorjones, 13 February 2017 - 06:00 AM.