368 replies to this topic

[Ukos]

It would be good to add some different options for the weapon tree quirks to make weapons a bit more distinct as opposed to the lack lustre and uninspiring option for the LBX to have reduced spread as its quirk investment which would be easily ignored.

How about changing this to increased chance to cause a critical hit or increased critical hit damage make it something people would be willing to spend points on?

For PPC's how about giving them the option to increase the time they disrupt E.C.M. and perhaps giving them a chance to knock peoples targeting display out for a couple of seconds if fully invested?

Make it so that they have an impact.

Some of the locations for nodes seem a little bizarre having to crawl to the depths of ballistics or energy to get all the cooldown or vice versa if you are running a ballistic build.

[Zergling]

Wintersdark, on 02 March 2017 - 09:40 AM, said:

Yup; if I was running ECM, I'd go all in on the sensors tree... but that kind of makes sense, really. Then you're building a infowar based mech, right?

It's a rather harsh penalty to get the full use out of ECM though. I'll probably be taking the Sensors tree on all my mechs, with minor alterations for ECM mechs (no need for Radar Deprivation when you have ECM, so even with the ECM skill nodes, a few points are saved).

Wintersdark, on 02 March 2017 - 09:40 AM, said:

If you're not going hard into weapons, then yeah. If you ARE going into weapons, though, simply generating less heat in the first place is functionally identical to dissipating more. Grab Heat Gen skills, and those Operations points are less important.

Actually, I mathed it out; -5% Heat Gen is inferior to +10% Heat Dissipation and +15% Max Heat.

-8% Heat Gen is equivalent in some cases, inferior in others, and costs more points.

Of course, if you are going that far into Firepower tree to get -8% Heat Gen, you'll have picked up a fair number of other bonuses; if your build makes use of them, that is probably a better idea than Operations tree.

But if your build does not, then it is better to go with Operations.

Bluttrunken, on 02 March 2017 - 09:54 AM, said:

@Zergling

If we could get all the good stuff in those trees, including a weapon specialization the skill tree would be pointless. The tree is about choices. Do I want a mobile, hard-hitting unit? A durable, cool running brawler? etc.

If we could just skill all the juiciest bits, there would be no sense in having a skill tree.

I'm not saying that at all.

The problem is still the same as the first PTS iteration; not all skill nodes are equal, so there are a limited number of build options that are superior to others, which effectively limits choice and diversity because it would be a bad idea to not take the superior options.

The skill system using trees with prerequisite selections is why it is impossible to balance the skill nodes; some prerequisites are useful to builds, but useless to others.

Eg, if the bonus given -% Heat Generation nodes are increased to make it equal in viability with Operations tree for builds that find the prerequisites in the Firepower tree useless, then -% Heat Generation build becomes optimal for everything that does find the prerequisites useful.

Edited by Zergling, 02 March 2017 - 08:57 PM.

[Wintersdark]

Zergling, on 02 March 2017 - 08:52 PM, said:

It's a rather harsh penalty to get the full use out of ECM though. I'll probably be taking the Sensors tree on all my mechs, with minor alterations for ECM mechs (no need for Radar Deprivation when you have ECM, so even with the ECM skill nodes, a few points are saved).

Not really, given its a valuable tree in its own right. If you don't care about an ECM bubble the tree is unnecessary but if you want to provide ECM support to your team, then you just "suck it up" and take the whole tree. Unlike some other cases, the skills in there are almost always useful.

Quote

Actually, I mathed it out; -5% Heat Gen is inferior to +10% Heat Dissipation and +15% Max Heat.

-8% Heat Gen is equivalent in some cases, inferior in others, and costs more points.

Of course, if you are going that far into Firepower tree to get -8% Heat Gen, you'll have picked up a fair number of other bonuses; if your build makes use of them, that is probably a better idea than Operations tree.

But if your build does not, then it is better to go with Operations.

Well, yes, but to get 10% dissipation and 15% cooling takes basically the whole Ops tree. It's better than 5% gen, certainly, but pretty similar to 8. It's a give and take really, so, yeah, exactly what I said . Heavy investment in Firepower, you can forgo ops. But if you're not getting a lot from firepower, Ops becomes much more valuable (well, build dependent of course).

[Zergling]

Wintersdark, on 02 March 2017 - 10:35 PM, said:

Not really, given its a valuable tree in its own right. If you don't care about an ECM bubble the tree is unnecessary but if you want to provide ECM support to your team, then you just "suck it up" and take the whole tree. Unlike some other cases, the skills in there are almost always useful.

Well, ECM mechs are typically already 'punished' for having ECM by having worse quirks or hardpoints than other variants of the same chassis.

Eg, Raven 3L vs Raven 2X/4X
Cicada 3M vs Cicada 2B
Griffin 2N vs Griffin 3M
Cataphract 0XP vs Cataphract 1X
Stalker 3Fb vs Stalker 3F

And the Hellbringer would likely have some quirks if it didn't have ECM, Shadow Cat would likely have much better quirks and/or hardpoints too.

Wintersdark, on 02 March 2017 - 10:35 PM, said:

Well, yes, but to get 10% dissipation and 15% cooling takes basically the whole Ops tree. It's better than 5% gen, certainly, but pretty similar to 8. It's a give and take really, so, yeah, exactly what I said . Heavy investment in Firepower, you can forgo ops. But if you're not getting a lot from firepower, Ops becomes much more valuable (well, build dependent of course).

Honestly, I suspect I'll go without mobility tree and stack Firepower with Operations tree.

Edited by Zergling, 03 March 2017 - 03:59 AM.

[Weeny Machine]

Zergling, on 03 March 2017 - 03:54 AM, said:

Well, ECM mechs are typically already 'punished' for having ECM by having worse quirks or hardpoints than other variants of the same chassis.

Eg, Raven 3L vs Raven 2X/4X
Cicada 3M vs Cicada 2B
Griffin 2N vs Griffin 3M
Cataphract 0XP vs Cataphract 1X
Stalker 3Fb vs Stalker 3F

And the Hellbringer would likely have some quirks if it didn't have ECM, Shadow Cat would likely have much better quirks and/or hardpoints too.




Honestly, I suspect I'll go without mobility tree and stack Firepower with Operations tree.

Still a mech with ECM lives usually much longer - especially when they are light mechs. Guess why the ACH does so well. It has barely quirks nor high speed. Granted, it doesn't suffer from giantism like the 35t mechs but still...

[Rhialto]

MajCyric, on 02 March 2017 - 03:29 AM, said:

Some advice... Use Alt+Enter over the Alt+Tab... MWO doesn't like the Alt tab combo for some reason on most systems...

This seems to work very well! Thanks!

[riffraff777]

Two suggestions:

YouTuber "Snuggles Time" proposed that you include some method of indicating whether a node was unlocked with mech xp or gxp. He suggested changing the outline color of a unlocked node to orange or violet to indicate this. You could also rotate the 12 o'clock/gray lock icon on the border or the node to unlocked at 9 o'clock/orange or 3 o'clock/violet as well as providing a 3-way toggle to swap the xp-type before changing state. Without this feature, troubleshooting a failed re-spec is a total pain.

Unrelated to the skill tree, changing the camera position or zoom in some of the cockpits is kinda disturbing. While it works well in the Victor, it's aggravating in the Catapult. You lose the aesthetics of the mech because you can't see any of the dash. Do you really want to hide Jason's artwork and make him Sad Panda? =(

[Xaat Xuun]

riffraff302, on 06 March 2017 - 12:08 AM, said:

Unrelated to the skill tree, changing the camera position or zoom in some of the cockpits is kinda disturbing. While it works well in the Victor, it's aggravating in the Catapult. You lose the aesthetics of the mech because you can't see any of the dash. Do you really want to hide Jason's artwork and make him Sad Panda? =(

not sure if you know or not, but in settings there is a slider for Pilots field of view.
I have mine set to 95, that allowed me to get a better view from the cockpit and could see more of the cockpit. I think it goes as high as 120, but I never found a need to go higher then 95 nor have I, might have to see what it looks like at max (slider all the way to the right).
I think default has it set at 30 . . that's like face in the window leaning forward.

this was something I recently discovered, after going into PTS for the first time, was testing something on a Kodiak, and mentioned, I could not see my claws, and the other pilot mentioned there was something in settings to fix that, but they couldn't recall the name, after our test, I went into settings and there it was, after a couple slides to the right I found my number.

Edited by Xaat Xuun, 06 March 2017 - 04:41 AM.

[Direwoof]

Rhialto, on 20 February 2017 - 07:37 PM, said:

Like Locust-1V ACCELERATION/DECELERATION RATE: 90.00 % will get to 0%? You can't do this... Can't imagine all Locust slowed down to all be the same. Same for many other light/medium Mechs.

Yeah my phoenix hawk will be completely useless if it cant speed up and slow down like it can now.

[Widowmaker1981]

Wintersdark, on 02 March 2017 - 10:35 PM, said:

Not really, given its a valuable tree in its own right. If you don't care about an ECM bubble the tree is unnecessary but if you want to provide ECM support to your team, then you just "suck it up" and take the whole tree. Unlike some other cases, the skills in there are almost always useful.

Actually, the ECM nodes are literally a complete essential if you have ECM.. there is no point in mounting it at all if you dont skill it. The nodes are nothing to do with bubble size, thats fixed at 90m and you cant change it, the nodes decrease the range at which you, personally, can be detected with normal sensors - which is being giganerfed as a default value to only a 30% reduction, meaning with no nodes skilled an ECM mech appears normally on sensors at 560m for a mech with no sensor range skills/bap. In other words totally useless.

ECM

• Base Range of Detection Scrambling reduced to 30% (from 75%).

• The remaining 45% is now unlocked through the Skill Tree (22.5% per Node)

ECM Design Notes: In this PTS we're attempting to address the low investment/high reward characteristics of ECM equipment in its new context under the Skill Tree. With the above reduction to its base range, utilizing ECM to its full effect will require focused advancement within the Skill Tree.

Edited by Widowmaker1981, 06 March 2017 - 05:16 AM.

[Widowmaker1981]

Bush Hopper, on 03 March 2017 - 11:48 AM, said:

Still a mech with ECM lives usually much longer - especially when they are light mechs. Guess why the ACH does so well. It has barely quirks nor high speed. Granted, it doesn't suffer from giantism like the 35t mechs but still...

Thats only because of the 'detaunt' effect of not having a dorito in PUGs tbh (if the enemy has 3 mechs they can see, and two of them have magic attention grabbing doritos while the 3rd does not, guess who is not going to be the one being shot at). Its way less effective in group queue, and id suggest pretty much irrelevant in comp gameplay.

[Wintersdark]

Widowmaker1981, on 06 March 2017 - 05:15 AM, said:

Actually, the ECM nodes are literally a complete essential if you have ECM.. there is no point in mounting it at all if you dont skill it. The nodes are nothing to do with bubble size, thats fixed at 90m and you cant change it, the nodes decrease the range at which you, personally, can be detected with normal sensors - which is being giganerfed as a default value to only a 30% reduction, meaning with no nodes skilled an ECM mech appears normally on sensors at 560m for a mech with no sensor range skills/bap. In other words totally useless.

ECM

• Base Range of Detection Scrambling reduced to 30% (from 75%).

• The remaining 45% is now unlocked through the Skill Tree (22.5% per Node)

ECM Design Notes: In this PTS we're attempting to address the low investment/high reward characteristics of ECM equipment in its new context under the Skill Tree. With the above reduction to its base range, utilizing ECM to its full effect will require focused advancement within the Skill Tree.

You are indeed correct, I misread that and wasn't really investigating sensors at all - I focused on firepower and agility.

Still, I don't really view this as a problem. Infowars Mechs be Infowars Mechs.

[Radkres]

For a ECM Mech You think it would be a separate tree altogether like the jumpjet tree because they are so few.

[Widowmaker1981]

Wintersdark, on 06 March 2017 - 05:58 AM, said:

You are indeed correct, I misread that and wasn't really investigating sensors at all - I focused on firepower and agility.

Still, I don't really view this as a problem. Infowars Mechs be Infowars Mechs.

Yeah its not a problem, ECM is a little too strong for the cost at the moment in my opinion, so requiring it to be skilled to be useful is fine with me. Just saying that the skills arent a 'nice to have' thing with ECM, they are literally required.

[MookieDog]

All of this talk about reduction.. I am just trying to think how slow IS are really going to be. XL engines are basically a death sentence since everyone now shoots for the right torso, which means standard engine.

Soooo for a 75 ton mech sacrificing one third of its weight.. yup.. one third of my weight before weapons and heatsinks and that puts me at 64.8. For half of my weight I can move at 70 kph.

Most heavy clan mechs are moving at 81 kph.

While I may have some armor, 54 points. The alpha off of an Ebon Jag B is 61 points, at 10 tons less. So two Alphas means dead from only having half a mech or a leg gone which puts me at 30-35kph.. which still means dead.

I wont even get into the Arctic Cheater stupidity. Think of Taz the Tasmanian Devil on speed. Seventeen points to try to get the full advantages of speed tweak which I USED to have.. but not any more. I guess I get to make my mech the PGI wanted it.

CW/FW?!? LOL not a chance.

Edited by MookieDog, 13 March 2017 - 01:43 PM.

[Shinear]

[Redacted]

Edited by draiocht, 24 May 2017 - 08:30 AM.
inappropriate language, unconstructive

[Kaethir]

riffraff302, on 06 March 2017 - 12:08 AM, said:

YouTuber "Snuggles Time" proposed that you include some method of indicating whether a node was unlocked with mech xp or gxp. He suggested changing the outline color of a unlocked node to orange or violet to indicate this.

Nodes are only unlocked with SP, and I doubt they track, once SP are converted/purchased, the source of the SP. It's just a bucket.

Now if you're referring to respec costs that's another thing entirely.

[Mycroft000]

Kaethir, on 23 May 2017 - 06:13 AM, said:

Nodes are only unlocked with SP, and I doubt they track, once SP are converted/purchased, the source of the SP. It's just a bucket.

Now if you're referring to respec costs that's another thing entirely.

I think the intention here is to want a way to tell if you're reactivating a node with GXP or MXP. Which makes sense, just make the reactivated nodes blue with a purple ring, or blue with an orange ring. Simple(or so it seems to someone who has absolutely no coding experience whatsoever).

[MunStarr]

I have a distinct dislike for how you guys did the skill tree. Honestly, I've ground all 90-ish of my mechs x3 up from base models. So that's a chore I didn't really desire again. However, I can understand why you guys did it to avoid making the all-the-same-generic meta builds. But what I really can't forgive is the lack of rhyme or reason to how you put together these skill "wreathes" (cuz face it...these are NOT anything resembling a skill tree). How can you possibly explain that I need waste 4 completely unrelated skill points to get a zoom? That's just silly. 90-ish MECHs and never wasted a cbill dime on anti-shake or shock absorbtion....but now I have no choice but waste limited points?! And why do some skill points arbitrarily cost more than others? So far I haven't been able to figure out a rhyme or reason for that either?

Having grumbled all that. I did like that you guys added extra magazines and perks to make existing load outs more effective. I just hate now that I basically have to get CT'ed almost every match because I have to choose between the ability to turn to use it or having more armor / frame. So it's a love-hate thing...but mostly love to hate it. I already ground thru all these once....now I have the chore of doing it all over....but I guess I can spend my time doing that now vs. buying and trying out new mechs....with new skill tree....sigh.

[Kaethir]

mycroft000, on 23 May 2017 - 08:28 AM, said:

I think the intention here is to want a way to tell if you're reactivating a node with GXP or MXP. Which makes sense, just make the reactivated nodes blue with a purple ring, or blue with an orange ring. Simple(or so it seems to someone who has absolutely no coding experience whatsoever).

I would think it depends on the implementation they did.

I haven't changed any specs yet so I don't have a clear indication of that particular issue.