103 replies to this topic

[Skribs]

You're assuming people only want 1 variant. It's a dumb rule to require 3, but a lot of people still like multiple variants.

[Bellum Dominum]

Skribs, on 23 February 2017 - 09:18 PM, said:

You're assuming people only want 1 variant. It's a dumb rule to require 3, but a lot of people still like multiple variants.

No I'm just using a base 1 to experience what mastering a first mech will be like. I can't simulate new player skill level but I can force myself to use 0 cbills and xp for my starting pool. It is the best I can do personally to get as much of an impression as possible and therefore the most honest impression I can get. Perhaps it'll take me 5 days and will be won over to the argument that some tweaking needs to be done on it... perhaps.

Edited by Bellum Dominum, 23 February 2017 - 09:34 PM.

[Skribs]

I'm not looking at it from the perspective of a new player.

I'm looking at it from the perspective of a player who will have to choose between getting only 1/3 of the Mechs I used to have mastered or getting all of my Mechs with XP only 1/3 of their skills, because PGI added a secondary grind to the leveling experience, and who will then spend at least a year catching back up.

[soapyfrog]

Bellum Dominum, on 23 February 2017 - 09:17 PM, said:

Not at all. You want to keep falling back on an argument that fails as it is. Pointed out by more than just myself at this point. Myself I don't think respec should exist at all unless PGI does major changes and then it should be free, but you don't see me actually arguing for that and you want to know why? Because I try to think in terms of the community as a whole instead of my own personal wants, as opposed to most of your own arguments.

This is the very definition of trolling btw. Making arguments you don't believe in, for the sake of argument. But I will assume good faith as I have til this point.

If respec has a cost, it encourages people to build for the meta and then never change it until the meta shifts.

If respec is free people can experiment and try odd builds and different weapons and funny builds and builds for one off lobby games with friends etc etc etc.

So your argument that discouraging respec promotes diversity is extremely unpersuasive.

Lastly your argument that people won't be able to shift to the meta if they want is also unpersuasive, because first of all it's unlikely to actually have the effect you think (people who care about the meta will take the time to build for it), and second of all you should let people enjoy the game the way they want to as much as possible, and a tax on choice gets in the way of that.

Lastly the per mech grind is increasing 26%. With the removal of the 3 mech rule, if you only want one variant of a chassis then it is a shorter grind, if you want two variants it is just about the same, and if you want three or more variants, it is 26% longer. Of course this is assuming you don't make any changes to your skill tree as you level, which of course was not a problem in the old system.

As I said, though the grind is longer and I think a shorter grind is more desirable for all players and for PGI mech sales, in the new system at least it is acceptable compared to the previously proposed 250% increase. The xp respec cost, however is still to me unacceptable. The idea of docking your players xp for any reason kinda died out 15+ years ago, and for good reason... people do not like to be knocked backward... and tbh there is really no reason why a respec should cost xp.

Edited by soapyfrog, 23 February 2017 - 10:11 PM.

[Bellum Dominum]

Actually the current state of the game is a prime example of my argument in terms of freely swapping to meta killing diversity, and again this is supposed to be part of why the system is coming into play. I really don't know how this could be difficult to understand.

No I didn't make any argument for something that I don't actually want I simply didn't argue for something that I personally want. Which certainly is not trolling.

Xp cost for respec... pretty simple to understand. The xp you have is with a different load out/configuration.. of course it is going to take 'time' to get used to the new loadout. hence an xp cost

Edited by Bellum Dominum, 23 February 2017 - 10:22 PM.

[soapyfrog]

Bellum Dominum, on 23 February 2017 - 10:14 PM, said:

Actually the current state of the game is a prime example of my argument in terms of freely swapping to meta killing diversity, and again this is supposed to be part of why the system is coming into play. I really don't know how this could be difficult to understand.

The current state of the game has a great deal of diversity. I see weird and different builds all the time.

I don't know how you cannot understand that taxing respecs means less variety. People will just go to a cookie cutter build and never or very rarely change it. Builds that are just for fun or experimental become all but extinct. Serious meta builds ONLY.

[50 50]

Bellum Dominum, on 23 February 2017 - 07:04 PM, said:

True however the cost variance in buying a pack versus simply buying each mech singulary has to be included. Don't forget that you get more than simply the mechs in those packs as well. Perhaps these changes will lead to less expensive mech packs? Would that be a bad thing?

We also don't know what we will see in the mech packs as bonuses.
What if they come with some free skill points just like how we used to get a module with the packs.
There are a variety of possibilities that will make the packs just as appealing to pick up.

Skribs, on 23 February 2017 - 07:59 PM, said:

Not everyone has 5 hours to spare every day.

The problem people have is that this a grind that's going to take quite a bit of time to get through, that we feel we've already been through.

Not necessarily though. The only bit you might miss on is some c-bills which is all down to how many modules do you currently have. The XP spent on mastering the mech at the moment is getting refunded so you just need to reapply those points and it's porbably likely you may have excess XP on those mechs at the moment, because like all of us, we like to jump in those mechs and have a run around every so often. There will also be all the GXP used to get the various pilot skills so there will be a fair bit extra coming back to help buy those skills.

The respec cost is a different situation. I have to say I didn't quite understand how it was going to work so it will be interesting to test it on the server. But if skills are bought as a pool for each variant and then applied to the nodes, having a cost to respec and unlock those points so they could be reapplied is pretty reasonable and not uncommon to many other games out there. I'm hoping that's what it is.

On a side note and for a bit of fun, would be cool to add a little NPC to our mech labs that reduce the costs.

Edited by 50 50, 23 February 2017 - 10:46 PM.

[NeoCodex]

The OP is right. I should cancel my Assassin preorder. I will have no time to grind it. Too many old mechs to invest into. Like, uh... Jenners.

[Skribs]

50 50, on 23 February 2017 - 10:45 PM, said:

We also don't know what we will see in the mech packs as bonuses.
What if they come with some free skill points just like how we used to get a module with the packs.
There are a variety of possibilities that will make the packs just as appealing to pick up.


Not necessarily though. The only bit you might miss on is some c-bills which is all down to how many modules do you currently have. The XP spent on mastering the mech at the moment is getting refunded so you just need to reapply those points and it's porbably likely you may have excess XP on those mechs at the moment, because like all of us, we like to jump in those mechs and have a run around every so often. There will also be all the GXP used to get the various pilot skills so there will be a fair bit extra coming back to help buy those skills.

The respec cost is a different situation. I have to say I didn't quite understand how it was going to work so it will be interesting to test it on the server. But if skills are bought as a pool for each variant and then applied to the nodes, having a cost to respec and unlock those points so they could be reapplied is pretty reasonable and not uncommon to many other games out there. I'm hoping that's what it is.

On a side note and for a bit of fun, would be cool to add a little NPC to our mech labs that reduce the costs.

The C-Bill cost is exactly what we are looking at. It will be 5.46 million per mech with the latest information provided by PGI. I have 150 million C-Bills coming from modules, which means I will be able to master 27 Mechs with what I get from them. Considering I have 80 mastered now, that leaves 53 to master.

Now, PGI may change their mind, in which case the numbers will change. But it's not guesswork as to how many I can master, it is math. I can master 27 with the refunds I will get, which will leave me 53 to master, and that's just to catch back up to where I am now.

That's the equivalent of getting more than 17 chassis at 3 variants per chassis. Now, I average 160k C-Bills per match. I play probably 15 hours a week on average. If you figure 6 matches per hour, I can get roughly 14.4 million C-Bills a week. That means 3 Mechs per week of the 53 I need. So it would take me 17 weeks, or just over 4 months, just to get the C-Bills I need in order to catch up.

That's not an assumption. That's not a random guess. That is math. Technically it is a guess, but an educated and calculated one. If I play less matches (because RL things going on, because longer matches, because people take too long to get ready, because I decide to go outside during the summer, because I get bored and watch TV instead, etc) it will take longer.

Now, that's for me, and that's just to catch up to where I am now. I'd still have about 70 Mechs left to master before I'd really need to buy anything else (ones I've gotten through packs or sales and haven't gotten to yet). So I'm expecting to spend 4+ months climbing a mountain I just got shoved off of by PGI, and then probably as long, if not longer, to level up the Mechs I don't have mastered yet.

By making it cost C-Bills to level up, PGI is essentially saying it's okay if I spend $0 on the game for the next year, because I'll be farming up C-Bills in order to level Mechs that I already have plenty of XP on. If we just had to get a little bit more XP, that would be one thing, and equivalent to an increase in level cap in a RPG. But to force us to spend months just to catch up to where we were before is a very bad idea.

[50 50]

A big point to make is that what is considered mastering a mech with the skill trees, ie. 91 skill nodes bought and paid for, is not the same as it is under the existing system. It's more like 50 skills and 3,000,000 c-bills.
The difference is in thinking that the additional points is the equivalent of what we have now.

Think of it this way.
Ever played an MMO where they set the level cap at 50 so you finish your character and decide to build another. Then the cap gets increased and it all changes and you have go back to that character and level it up another 10 levels?
That's what this is.

At the moment your mastered mech is at level 50. That cap is getting increased and you can now take it up to level 91.
But it's also converting from an old system to a new one where the scale/measurement is different.

Still, I think we should only have 50 skill nodes max.
Would 3,000,000 be a more reasonable cost?

[Zergling]

Probably Not, on 23 February 2017 - 04:17 PM, said:

What the ****? Are you seriously bragging that you're a bigger sucker than him?

It's not like he has anything else to brag about.

[Dee Eight]

Probably Not, on 23 February 2017 - 04:17 PM, said:

What the ****? Are you seriously bragging that you're a bigger sucker than him?

I don't think spending money on a game I enjoy as being a sucker. Its not like I can take it to the grave with me (the money) anyway.

[soapyfrog]

50 50, on 23 February 2017 - 11:20 PM, said:

Ever played an MMO where they set the level cap at 50 so you finish your character and decide to build another. Then the cap gets increased and it all changes and you have go back to that character and level it up another 10 levels?
That's what this is.

Level cap increases in MMOs are accompanied by rafts of new content to explore during your new levelling progression. That is not happening here.

The more accurate analogy would be if you were playing an MMO with a level cap of 50 and all your characters were arbitrarily knocked back 10 levels with no addition of content. Also if you want to change your spec you lose a level.

[Skribs]

The difference is in an MMO you don't start an expansion with 8 level 60 characters and decide to instantly make 3 of them level 70 immediately while the rest drop back down to level 1.

[Dogstar]

Having gone through numerous expansions in WoW I can say that this is nothing like a level cap increase.

This is a grinding tax on past purchases pure and simple.

Edited by Dogstar, 24 February 2017 - 11:26 AM.

[Malrock]

50 50, on 23 February 2017 - 11:20 PM, said:

A big point to make is that what is considered mastering a mech with the skill trees, ie. 91 skill nodes bought and paid for, is not the same as it is under the existing system. It's more like 50 skills and 3,000,000 c-bills.
The difference is in thinking that the additional points is the equivalent of what we have now.

Think of it this way.
Ever played an MMO where they set the level cap at 50 so you finish your character and decide to build another. Then the cap gets increased and it all changes and you have go back to that character and level it up another 10 levels?
That's what this is.

At the moment your mastered mech is at level 50. That cap is getting increased and you can now take it up to level 91.
But it's also converting from an old system to a new one where the scale/measurement is different.

Still, I think we should only have 50 skill nodes max.
Would 3,000,000 be a more reasonable cost?

No that is the problem that isn't what this is. What this change is like is if you hit level cap at 50 like in your previous example, and then they said we are releasing the expansion, but in the expansion, we will take the cap to 70 but instead of starting off at 50 (and thereby respecting all the effort you have already made in this game) we will be starting you all over at level 1. Enjoy re-grinding level 1-50 and then grinding the extra 20 levels after that.

[Baulven]

Dee Eight, on 23 February 2017 - 04:15 PM, said:

That's terrific however I've spent MORE, and there are plenty of others like me who will keep PGI afloat than there are folks who are like you.

Do you plan on spending an extra thousand a year to make up for his thousand for the next two years? If not what you are spending and will continue to spend is irrelevant to the fact they will be losing his business for a while until he gets back to his happy point. That's why people bring this up, because unless you and others are making up for the lost dollars by going above and beyond, it will be a loss for PGI.

I get there needs to be a cbills sink, and there are plenty of ways to do that, but shafting part of the player base that pays them is not smart. Hell give emote half price nodes while premium time is active (free players get it from events so it isn't like they will not have access to it at times) and make it easier for paying players to feel like they aren't being hosed.

[chucklesMuch]

I think that they should consider a discount per variant for skill tree cost and or one off cbill hxp payment per mastered mech people have. The goal to avoid peeps with many many mechs feeling like they have gotten a very raw deal for supporting the game with time and money

[Dodger79]

People are arguing that the nodes _need_ to cost CB because the former modules (you had to buy for CB, atleast one to swap around) are costing CB. So, why doesn't PGI charge CB only for nodes representing former modules? That way i can tweak my mobility etc. CB-free just like now.

What really p*sses me of is that right now if i have mastered a variant every additional variant of this i buy is already mastered, too. For example, i have 4 differently fitted CTF-3D, just because i love(d) it and wanted to be able to switch my config fast, get into another game with my favourite Mech after dying early in a game etc. Now i would need to buy all 91 skill nodes for everyone of these 4 CTF-3D. Wouldn't be that much of a problem considering how long i have played it and how many XP beyond mastery i've earned on it. BUT: i converted these XP into GXP. For real money. Because they were useless on this Mech. With the new skill tree this real money will be lost, because mainly i used converted GXP to level the 2nd and 3rd unwanted variants of a chassis to master the variant i like. Which means that these former GXP will now be HXP on a variant i most probably never will play again (and in a lot of cases i don't even own anymore), what makes it kind of lost XP.

And the CTF-3D is not the only variant i own multiples of, so my problem multiplies.

Then we have PGI's typical balance-changes which make great variants meh again and sometimes vice versa, so if i own and master several Mechs of the same variant in the new system and the balancing shifts, then i am screwed big time.

So, for me personally the new system (which as a system itself i pretty much like btw) punishes me for having bought a lot of Mechs (263 Mechs, most through Packs/MCs), having multiple Mechs of the same variant and additionally it gives me a big "f*ck you, HAHA!!!" for having spent real money for GXP-conversions.

Most probably MWO will have lost me as a paying customer because of that, despite i still like the game and the basic idea of a skill tree instead of what we have now. But these changes do not make me want to spend any real money anymore, just because it shows how low the appreciation from PGI to long time paying customers is (these changes hurt whales and collectors the most).

[50 50]

Malrock, on 24 February 2017 - 03:17 PM, said:

No that is the problem that isn't what this is. What this change is like is if you hit level cap at 50 like in your previous example, and then they said we are releasing the expansion, but in the expansion, we will take the cap to 70 but instead of starting off at 50 (and thereby respecting all the effort you have already made in this game) we will be starting you all over at level 1. Enjoy re-grinding level 1-50 and then grinding the extra 20 levels after that.

LotRO was an example of an MMO where they increased the level cap and skills you had on a character moved to a higher level meaning you had to level up again to get those skills back. Didn't get any refund for the efforts with that one.

However, with MWO if we take the example of a mastered mech we have:
Master skill: 21,500xp
4 Elite skills: 21,000xp
8 Basic Skills: 14,250xp
So we get a refund of 57,250xp
That's enough XP to buy 71 skill nodes at the new cost of 800xp/node.
If those 13 original skills were broken up into 5 levels each, that would have been 65 nodes.
As it is, pin point, fast fire and the module slot (not sure about the consumable change at this stage) are not included in the new tree but let's say the old mech tree has ported over 10 skills into the new system for a total of 50 nodes.
You will still have 21 nodes worth of xp refunded from a currently mastered mech to effectively put into 4 modules worth of skills.

If we can also assume that on that mastered mech you did have 4 modules installed the c-bill refund would likely be in excess of 10,000,000 c-bills. (2 weapon modules would be 6 mil + 2 other modules which at their cheapest would be another 4mil but likely more). So with that refund you should be able to spend 3,000,000 on 3 mechs to get those first 50 nodes for each. Now if you happened to have kitted out at least 1/3rd of your mechs with the typical 4 modules: 2 weapon, radar deprivation and seismic sensor you would have 18 mil refunded for those sets. Split that difference 3 ways again for another 3,000,000 to each mech and you will have enough c-bills to afford the extra 41 nodes on all three of those mechs and have 540,000 x3 c-bills left over.

Chances are on each of those mechs you will also have some excess mech XP. You only need another 16,000 xp to get those last 20 skill nodes. Given there is also the refund from the GXP spent on getting the modules and more than likely a bunch of left over GXP anyway, you will probably be able to complete the skill tree with the extra goodies.

So, all that said, the exceptions will be those players who for some reason have hundreds of mechs but only ever bought a handful of modules which they religiously swapped between mechs. You will miss out on some c-bills and potentially not be able to afford all the skills. But this will only be those players who have less than 1/3rd of your mechs fully equipped with modules.
If you are, put your hand up and accept that this is the choice you made. HOWEVER, if you can afford 3 mil for each of those mechs and have enough XP on the mech or floating around as GXP to afford the 40,000xp (50*800xp) cost to get those first 50 nodes then you will be no worse off. Better even as you have the choice of which 50 nodes you actually want to get.

BUT THERE IS HOPE!!
Do you have a few extra weapons lying around in your inventory, perhaps a bunch of additional heatsinks or some old engines.
Maybe you have a few duplicate mechs that you won and really don't want or need. You will have a way to fund your costs to get these skills if you did not get a big refund from modules. For example, if I look at my inventory at the moment I have 36 clan medium pulse lasers. I can sell each one of those for 60,000 c-bills. That's one node per laser and I have plenty of other items I can sell if I want to.

So, I hope that helps to clarify the situation as it is looking at v2.0 of the skill tree.