18 replies to this topic

[Xetelian]

As someone who has a AWS PB with a 350 XL in it and enjoys swinging the barn door side to side what will I do when mobility is tied to tonnage and having a bigger engine isn't advantageous like it is now?


I can imagine that a KDK pilot with a 375 XL is going to hate his life but how many less than stellar mechs are going to end up in the garbage bin after this?

Please don't tell me just to use the mobility skill tree to make up for the loss because we don't know if the mobility nodes in the skill tree are even going to be that strong or how much investment is going to be needed. My main skill tree goal as a mostly assault pilot is Radar Dep. and Armor/Structure quirks.


I know a very vocal group of players wanted this but I think this will kill the already dead HGN, GAR, EXE, VTR and AWS. Assaults, even with the KDK 3, aren't ran as often as Heavies and often not as much as mediums.

Lights and Assaults don't need anymore nerfs in my opinion.

[El Bandito]

PGI specifically said certain mechs will have better mobility than same tonnage mechs as sort of an in-built quirk. I am sure sub-par Assaults such as PB and Gargles will have better mobility than many Assaults, and the skill tree will further enhance it. This is PGI's way of slightly balancing the classes, while improving Clan vs. IS balance as well.

And Lights will benefit from this change the most, cause they can now run around Heavies and Assaults easily. Dunno why you are worried about them.

Edited by El Bandito, 22 February 2017 - 12:18 AM.

[Weeny Machine]

El Bandito, on 22 February 2017 - 12:13 AM, said:

PGI specifically said certain mechs will have better mobility than same tonnage mechs as sort of an in-built quirk. I am sure sub-par Assaults such as PB and Gargles will have better mobility than many Assaults, and the skill tree will further enhance it. This is PGI's way of slightly balancing the classes, while improving Clan vs. IS balance as well.

And Lights will benefit from this change the most, cause they can now run around Heavies and Assaults easily. Dunno why you are worried about them.

Lights will benefit the most because *drumroll* most of the chassis had hardly any decel/accel or other agility quirks or they were low to begin with. They were treated like red-haired stepchildren anyway when it comes to quirks. On the other hand, heavies and assaults have such bloated agility quirks in quite a lot of cases. Power creep at its finest.

And yes, the whining will be epic when suddenly heavy and assaults do not behave like mechs of a lower weight class - or should I say fat, armed to the teeth, heavily armoured prina ballerinas? However, having tons of heat sinks, weapons and armour should have also a disadvantage

Edited by Bush Hopper, 22 February 2017 - 06:29 AM.

[Amsro]

I think this is a great idea to test out.

I'll still be taking my large XL engine for speed, if everyone else is getting the same agility nerf so to speak then the extra speed will still have an advantage.

Can't wait to test it out

[Hit the Deck]

You still don't know what level of agility they will assign to each weight class.

Taking the extremes as an example, all Assaults could be as sluggish as the Dire Wolf or as nimble as the old Ballerina Bear.

Or they could take the average agility of each weight class and assign that to every 'Mech in the respective weight class.

[Bud Crue]

Just get on the PTS when it goes live and let em know which mechs feel messed up. It worked for the skill tree (I we hope and their commentary seems to agree with that hope); it may very well work with this too.

I expect them to apply a general performance "formula" across all mechs that will make some feel awful and some feel like jack rabbits on a speed bender. We need to make them aware of these outliers; and they may even address them without killing engine decoupling all together. This is what the PTS was designed for, so lets do this. I just wish they were doing engine decoupling on a later PTS AFTER the skills tree was somewhat established.

[Dino Might]

This proposed change has me so interested, I even picked up my sticks for a few games last night. Boy, am I rusty. I also don't think it helps trying a game or two with a joystick. Still looking for a cheap steering wheel to drive my Locust with, which will be amazing when KDKs can no longer out-turn/out-twist me.

[Morggo]

Normally I also prefer to see major changes tested individually in separate PTS sessions.. however I kind of see how the decouple needs to be tested in conjunction with the skill tree... they are actually tightly interwoven given the skill tree is now the only path to improved mobility plus the direct relation of the percentage based mobility skill bonuses and various base mobility stats each mech should have. If you test them separate you won't actually have the full picture of what a 'final' state would drive like.

So this one time I have to agree with PGI you need to test decouple and skills together.

Edit: Back to OP.... I am a big fan of the decouple as long as it is followed through with the tailored base stats as a good balance tool. Engines should make you go faster, not corner and dance better, imo.

Edited by Morggo, 22 February 2017 - 06:10 AM.

[MrMadguy]

Biggest question - should engine prices be cut in half after this change?

[Sjorpha]

It's an interesting change.

Lights and mediums need a buff in general, which this seems to do. Low engine ratings might become more competitive, which is great since most stock mechs come with slower engines than what is currently good.

Mechs can now have their base agility adjusted for balance reasons to a larger effect than before, making it a possible approach for making IS heavies and assaults more competitive, you could have IS mechs be more agile in general for example.

Largely positive. It will require some adjustments to help those mechs that are hit the hardest by it, specifically brawly assault mechs that rely on large engines and agility quirks to torso twist a lot. Atlas and Banshee comes to mind. But I think we should accept the initial balance problems in this case, since it seems like a good long term systemic change to me.

[Bud Crue]

Morggo, on 22 February 2017 - 06:08 AM, said:

Normally I also prefer to see major changes tested individually in separate PTS sessions.. however I kind of see how the decouple needs to be tested in conjunction with the skill tree... they are actually tightly interwoven given the skill tree is now the only path to improved mobility plus the direct relation of the percentage based mobility skill bonuses and various base mobility stats each mech should have. If you test them separate you won't actually have the full picture of what a 'final' state would drive like.

So this one time I have to agree with PGI you need to test decouple and skills together.

Edit: Back to OP.... I am a big fan of the decouple as long as it is followed through with the tailored base stats as a good balance tool. Engines should make you go faster, not corner and dance better, imo.

Maybe...but only if the agility branch really is dramatically changed and made utterly dependent on the decoupling aspect. My suspicion is that given the simultaneous and out of left field addition of engine decoupling, it is intended as an effective across the board nerf to mobility such that we are "required" to use nodes on the agility branch to give the illusion of actual give and take with the rest of the skills tree by thus limiting the amount of nodes you can use. If I am right this whole thing is just a way to make agility branch the equivelant sink as survivability was on the first go around of the PTS.

[NRP]

This is the change that will finally kill the Kodiaks. Maybe.

[Hit the Deck]

Sjorpha, on 22 February 2017 - 06:45 AM, said:

....
It will require some adjustments to help those mechs that are hit the hardest by it, specifically brawly assault mechs that rely on large engines and agility quirks to torso twist a lot.
....

They could very well make the XL400'ed Banshee's agility as the base agility for all Assault 'Mechs thus effectively buffing almost all Assaults.

I doubt it though.

Edited by Hit the Deck, 22 February 2017 - 07:16 AM.

[Amsro]

Hit the Deck, on 22 February 2017 - 07:14 AM, said:

They could very well make the XL400'ed Banshee's agility as the base agility for all Assault 'Mechs thus effectively buffing almost all Assaults.

I doubt it though.

The baseline agility for mechs will be class based yes, but they did mention that certain chassis will get their own agility. See how this balances out.

I would suspect the current agility of 300 series engines will be used for most assault chassis. Just a random guess.

[Hit the Deck]

Amsro, on 22 February 2017 - 07:27 AM, said:

....
I would suspect the current agility of 300 series engines will be used for most assault chassis. Just a random guess.

That makes sense because a lot of stock Assaults run at 54kph.

Edited by Hit the Deck, 22 February 2017 - 07:34 AM.

[LordNothing]

rip banshee

[Morggo]

Bud Crue, on 22 February 2017 - 07:09 AM, said:

Maybe...but only if the agility branch really is dramatically changed and made utterly dependent on the decoupling aspect. My suspicion is that given the simultaneous and out of left field addition of engine decoupling, it is intended as an effective across the board nerf to mobility such that we are "required" to use nodes on the agility branch to give the illusion of actual give and take with the rest of the skills tree by thus limiting the amount of nodes you can use. If I am right this whole thing is just a way to make agility branch the equivelant sink as survivability was on the first go around of the PTS.

True, hadn't looked at it from that perspective. They say they had planned it all along and it just wasn't ready for PTS-1.... IF you take that as true then I'd lean toward a good test plan for PGI... however I ALSO believe now that your theory of 'forcing' more diversity away from all mechs taking defense and weapon only appears valid.

Not that I am totally against this... I would love to see skill trees that do force 'the hard decisions' and cause flavors of mech builds. Essentially, with this change forcing mobility to move from PTS-1 "why would anyone put any points into upper/lower chassis trees" to PTS-2 "wow, I'm going to have to decide which trees/skills to not go as deep into 'cuz I really need a few mobility nodes.

tl;dr
Yeah, have to agree with you the decouple, planned or not, is clearly a move to ensure that all trees, even mobility, are viable necessary and used.

Edit

Edited by Morggo, 22 February 2017 - 07:35 AM.

[LordNothing]

MrMadguy, on 22 February 2017 - 06:27 AM, said:

Biggest question - should engine prices be cut in half after this change?

only if they refund the other half.

[Bud Crue]

Morggo, on 22 February 2017 - 07:33 AM, said:

tl;dr
Yeah, have to agree with you the decouple, planned or not, is clearly a move to ensure that all trees, even mobility, are viable necessary and used.

Edit

Who knows, it might be a good thing if it makes us make real choices. But if it ends up taking away current functionality accross the board that all mechs (mastered or otherwise) currently enjoy, then people will go nuts on it, for many of the same reasons they went nuts on skills tree PTS 1.0. If that should happen, the fact that we don't have to spend as much XP and cbills to rebuild mechs of significantly less functionality will not save it (assuming PGI listens).