12 replies to this topic

[Elizander]

Just posting this to make sure people check that the nerf to agility/mobility doesn't severely affect the tutorial where you use a Thunderbolt to run through the city to get a gold medal for additional rewards.

[Grixa19]

No more Call Of Duty: Mechwarrior Warfare?
So shame PGI! Those kids who play ur game are grown on CoD...

[tokumboh]

Elizander, on 03 March 2017 - 09:06 PM, said:

Just posting this to make sure people check that the nerf to agility/mobility doesn't severely affect the tutorial where you use a Thunderbolt to run through the city to get a gold medal for additional rewards.

I just checked this and it feels the same, I managed close to 1:30 on the first attempt.

I also tried my mechs on the battlefield as I had never done that on the live server (there appears to be very fiew people on the PTS to check out the defensive tree decisions and found it entertaining and frustrating at the same time. The mech I believe are spawned before you enter the battlefield area but are hard to spot on radar and indeed the chrips/warning would need to be explained somewhere. As I still am unsure as to whether they have locked me or it is a radar warning with no lock for example

[Sandslice]

It's not that they're hard to spot; their spawn locations are predictable. It's that they're omniscient and have elite aim, so you're getting lurmed from three angles and CT-drilled at approximately the moment you see one. Plus, at least half of them are carrying UAV and will use it almost immediately.

[Dave Forsey]

Elizander: Thanks for checking on the tutorial. The gold level is several seconds below my best time, so there should have been some wiggle room.

Sandslice: The battlezone mechs are a perfect team and actually use any lock one of them has.

Depending upon the random spawn, approximately half will have UAVs, but they have only one and fire them off when they see you... often when you're out of range.

[tokumboh]

Dave Forsey, on 06 March 2017 - 09:13 AM, said:

Elizander: Thanks for checking on the tutorial. The gold level is several seconds below my best time, so there should have been some wiggle room.

Sandslice: The battlezone mechs are a perfect team and actually use any lock one of them has.

Depending upon the random spawn, approximately half will have UAVs, but they have only one and fire them off when they see you... often when you're out of range.

Dave
Firstly thanks for answering the question. I wanted to raise two points in the whole tutorial and indeed a point of documentation of the game.

It is not clear what all the bitching betty noises actually mean and there is nothing on the website that actually tell you. It would be good to have somewhere that said what they meant even if it was a youtube video

The second point was about rewards system. Again you have to a a real search to find out what 'Lance in Formation' and many of the other things actually mean and how you trigger them and what rewards you get it is just maddening that these rewards are supposed to promote team play but they are not stated clearly on the website and indeed even more galling is that competitions many times rely on them.

My last point was just question about the battlefield. I presume the point of the perfect team applies to marksmanship also I seem to get hit before I see them either visually and on radar and when I am in a light mech I hardly get past two kill before I am dead unless i gingerly sneak around. When do they spawn? is before you enter the battlefield area as I do see a couple of mech far away on radar?

[tokumboh]

Sandslice, on 05 March 2017 - 04:28 PM, said:

It's not that they're hard to spot; their spawn locations are predictable. It's that they're omniscient and have elite aim, so you're getting lurmed from three angles and CT-drilled at approximately the moment you see one. Plus, at least half of them are carrying UAV and will use it almost immediately.

I have not played the battlefield on the live server as I never knew it was there, I can't get past two kills before I am downed in a light and it does mean I end up going around corners gingerly and pretty much at walking pace so I don't get a full aplha before I have even seen them by best score is in a CTF-0XP wne I got caught in a LRM storm have got 5 of them it was however a lot of fun and was good practice in look for the slightest signs on seismic and not forcing the issue around blind corners.

I will be back on the PTS tonight and I hope there will be someone to play against or else I be doing the battlefield again

[Dave Forsey]

From the horse's mouth:

"the TDR in the Academy would be getting a 10% mobility "boost" from the changes that we are implementing."

[Dave Forsey]

tokumboh, on 06 March 2017 - 11:28 AM, said:

Dave Firstly thanks for answering the question.

My last point was just question about the battlefield. I presume the point of the perfect team applies to marksmanship also I seem to get hit before I see them either visually and on radar and when I am in a light mech I hardly get past two kill before I am dead unless i gingerly sneak around. When do they spawn? is before you enter the battlefield area as I do see a couple of mech far away on radar?

The marksmanship isn't perfect, as it will fire if any part of the target is hit by the raycast and the AI mechs don't turn or move their arms any faster than normal.

But all the AI's know where you are and turn to face you. I considered adding some random degradation in targeting accuracy, and then realized how good some pilots are and decided to keep the challenge at maximum.

(The battlezone was snuck in at the last minute and there was no time to rig a configuration screen like the other challenges)

[Sandslice]

tokumboh, on 06 March 2017 - 11:28 AM, said:

My last point was just question about the battlefield. I presume the point of the perfect team applies to marksmanship also I seem to get hit before I see them either visually and on radar and when I am in a light mech I hardly get past two kill before I am dead unless i gingerly sneak around. When do they spawn? is before you enter the battlefield area as I do see a couple of mech far away on radar?

Just from what I've seen:

1. The "perfect teamwork" refers to information sharing: if you're in nominal sensor range of a 'Mech or UAV, all enemies know where you are, and any LRM-equipped units will cut loose.

2. Marksmanship is based on the speed / vector of your 'Mech; if you're in a light using good movement principles, the enemies will rake their lasers with varying degrees of shakiness, and will often fail to lead you enough with non-hitscan weapons (eg, a random Firebrand will have trouble hitting you with PPC/AC.) They can also be kinda bad at heat management depending on assigned damage; and if you catch an LRM-user alone and you have ECM, they will tend to hail-mary with those.

3. As for their spawns, a number will spawn when the Academy is first instanced; it's not all of them, but a fairly sizable proportion. They also do respawn; I went around to the beach behind the docks, worked my way up the wilderness toward the niche in I think D2 - wanted to retreat for repairs after fighting a Giant Enemy Crab, but an Atlas had respawned behind me and got me.

[tokumboh]

Sandslice, on 06 March 2017 - 02:42 PM, said:

Just from what I've seen:

1. The "perfect teamwork" refers to information sharing: if you're in nominal sensor range of a 'Mech or UAV, all enemies know where you are, and any LRM-equipped units will cut loose.

2. Marksmanship is based on the speed / vector of your 'Mech; if you're in a light using good movement principles, the enemies will rake their lasers with varying degrees of shakiness, and will often fail to lead you enough with non-hitscan weapons (eg, a random Firebrand will have trouble hitting you with PPC/AC.) They can also be kinda bad at heat management depending on assigned damage; and if you catch an LRM-user alone and you have ECM, they will tend to hail-mary with those.

3. As for their spawns, a number will spawn when the Academy is first instanced; it's not all of them, but a fairly sizable proportion. They also do respawn; I went around to the beach behind the docks, worked my way up the wilderness toward the niche in I think D2 - wanted to retreat for repairs after fighting a Giant Enemy Crab, but an Atlas had respawned behind me and got me.

Thanks for this work intervened last night so I hadn't got a chance to try either the PTS or the Battlezone. My one try in a light mech was a disaster I ran a ACH-PRIME I did kind of blundered into a SDR that ripped me to shreds before I could return fire and then having killed it I didn't have enough armour to tank being out in the open against a PNT, My attempt in CTF-0XP and BSW-X1 were much better I was getting 5:1 KDR before essentially running out of armour. it did make me change my approach in terms of trading and being just that bit more sneaky and tanking damage a lot less and it has paid some dividends in games. I'd like to try a CTF-L(L) since it has MASC and I really need to use it more for peaking and retreating. It is often an afterthought and it also gives a good practice for pop tarting too

Edited by tokumboh, 07 March 2017 - 06:27 AM.

[Dave Forsey]

Sandslice, on 06 March 2017 - 02:42 PM, said:

Just from what I've seen: 1. The "perfect teamwork" refers to information sharing: if you're in nominal sensor range of a 'Mech or UAV, all enemies know where you are, and any LRM-equipped units will cut loose. 2. Marksmanship is based on the speed / vector of your 'Mech; if you're in a light using good movement principles, the enemies will rake their lasers with varying degrees of shakiness, and will often fail to lead you enough with non-hitscan weapons (eg, a random Firebrand will have trouble hitting you with PPC/AC.) They can also be kinda bad at heat management depending on assigned damage; and if you catch an LRM-user alone and you have ECM, they will tend to hail-mary with those. 3. As for their spawns, a number will spawn when the Academy is first instanced; it's not all of them, but a fairly sizable proportion. They also do respawn; I went around to the beach behind the docks, worked my way up the wilderness toward the niche in I think D2 - wanted to retreat for repairs after fighting a Giant Enemy Crab, but an Atlas had respawned behind me and got me.

1) Correct -

2) They aim non-LRMs like this: (from what I recall, it's been a while)
- Turn legs towards target, torso towards CT
- Cast a ray from the cockpit straight ahead, if it touches the target, fire a subset of ready/in-range weapons
- Repeat (ignore heat warnings)

So, no leading

Mechs spawn at a subset of available locations at the start of the Academy (something like 12? out of 40+ locations)

Dead mechs should not respawn while you're looking at them, and not until at least 60 seconds have passed and you've gone a certain distance away

Respawns should not happen if the respawn point has you within line of sight. (but remember this is just a raycast from the cockpit, so if it hits anything else you'll be considered "out of sight"

Mechs repair (but not destroyed components?) and re-arm when you leave the battlezone, but don't change respawn points.

[Archer Magnus]

The academy is awesome, being able to change time of day, the challenges, the shooting ranges, and the battlezone!

I didn't know the battlezone was there until I took a random stroll through the map. At first I hated the LRM fire, but after playing it you realize you have to shoot down the UAVs if you are a slow mech, or get out of the area if you are fast enough. (Shame you can't shoot down missiles with your weapons.)

It's a great way to test your setups!

I would like a way to have a 1 on 1 fight with a full health mech, "arena style" in the academy. One idea would be to have the challenge beacon to spawn a light, medium, heavy, or assault then a random mech of that class drops into the city. That would give you plenty of cover to fight it.

You could also start the battlezone having a challenge beacon in the same area. My guess is most people don't know the battlezone is there (in you use part of that map for other challenges).