61 replies to this topic

[YouKnowNothing]

This is way too simple and easy to understand. Given PGI's history of convoluted and obfuscated mechanics and "features" (let's just say ghost heat, and the recent abomination of a skill tree - skill bush more likely ), I am fairly certain no one will consider this. The numbers might need to be tweaked a little, but overall it looks really great, it's simple, you are able to pick only the skills you consider useful to the role you want your mech to have.

[FireStoat]

Well done.

I'm uncertain that this system you've displayed is without flaw, but I am certain about one thing. If this was the skill tree design with the logic behind it explained at the Mech Con, the viewers would have flipped out, and not with a negative voice.

I think it captures the potential of variety and balancing mechs that under-perform as well as offering a simplicity that doesn't make the whole process feel like a chore to the player. I wish that the current system that is about to be forced on the players could have unnecessary parts stripped away so that it would be a simple as your design.

[50 50]

Very nicely presented and a good discussion of points.

I have to say I do not agree with the free points for the weapons.
I also felt that if the trees are a linear/streamlined as presented then there should be minimal skill points available, which you did reduce.
The more simplistic the tree, the less points we should have.

Personally I would like something a bit in between.
Some of the trees should have inter related skills.
For example: To get level 3 armour you also need level 2 in structure, to get level 5 you need to have a level in reduced fall damage,
Skills that made a bit of sense to group together.

Cost wise, I was ok with the 100k c-bills, that was reduced to 60k, that's fine and almost half the cost. Now I'm hearing 45k?
Given how often we have events where we can play and earn c-bills and complete an award to get even more, the cash is literally thrown at us.
The whole problem with the refund is those player who have less than 1/3rd of their mechs completely outfitted with modules.
I can understand the reasoning but it just boils down to personal choice of buying another mech or deciding that you wanted to keep certain modules on a mech. There is no good answer for that.
The only thing I can personally recommend to players in this position is to skill up your favourite mechs first as you will typically use those more which will generate the c-bills which you can then push onto your other mechs.
Otherwise, who knows what events we might see in the short term that could assist with this.... perhaps that's the solution, some sort of legacy mech mastery event.

I always thought the skill points would be a pool that we bought to add to the mechs so if we decided to reconfigure we put those points back into the pool to re-apply. It's not uncommon in games to have a cost for respecs. Many often charge more and more each time you do. A few hundred XP is not much unless for some reason you want to redo the entire tree.
But in terms of starting from scratch, these costs are not outrageous.

Eitherway, I am looking forward to the changes and being able to add the bonuses I would like to my mechs.

My main concern from the start was that we simply had too many points which meant it was to easy to just keep adding enhancements without really having to decide between different skills.

[The6thMessenger]

DAYUUUUUM!!!!
I WANT THIS!!!

[Cpt Zaepp]

I'm amazed about how much really well thought-through ideas floating around within the community.
This is particular good.

And now I'm even more disappointed in PGIs poor attempt to implement such a system.

[Lucky Rookie]

This is simply what the skill tree should have been from the start. This better than the PTS in every way. Kudos my friend, kudos.

[Temuedschin40]

+1 on this, great work Solahma o7

[UnseenFury]

Yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes !!!!!!!!!

[Lionheart2012]

And now for a dose of reality. This system would appear simple to the end user, but the architecture to support it would be tremendous. A tree for every weapons system? That is 64 trees currently, with more to come this summer. Further, multiply that by the number of mechs in the game, if you were to make the trees variant specific. And then that opens up the issue about fanboys for their mechs asking for specific tweaks to their tree.

A few simpler solutions as outlined:

• Increase the values of the nodes (e.g. cool run from 2.0% to 2.5%)
  
• Create more connections between nodes (vertically and horizontally)
  
• Eliminate the parent-child relationship between nodes and allow us to ladder up the tree as well as down.

[Pjwned]

So I tried to find this proposal after somebody else wrote a long a post frequently sucking off this idea for how supposedly great it was, and...

Quote

Firepower is no longer associated with the Skill Point Pool
Each mech will have a Firepower Rating that determines the maximum nodes, per weapon tree, that you can activate

I don't need to read or watch any further, this is stupid and not any better than what PGI has made.

Not that PGI's skill tree is good either, but right away this idea is worse.

[J0anna]

Overall I like this idea, I think you have too many SP in firepower, I'd rather have deadly weapons, than having to add skills to make them deadly. But the biggest negative I see is that this tree limits player choices based on what the tree creator thinks is best. For example, lets say I want to emphasize mobility more, under this system, I can't, I'm locked at whatever others think is best (I only have X sp to use here). I fear this will more likely lead to 'cookie cutter' setups like we have now. I do like the ability to avoid nodes that you don't want and starting in the center is better. Perhaps if we had a small pool of 'GSP' (say like 5) that we could add to any branch we choose, it would probably have my full support.

Edited by J0anna, 12 March 2017 - 04:00 AM.

[banana peel]

Pjwned, on 11 March 2017 - 09:08 PM, said:

...

I didnt agree with this either, when i was asked of an opinion on the subject. I do believe you can set values for firepower nodes that way their usefulness will match other nodes in the tree, and you dont have to make any restrictions. But Solahma's final decision was based on a direct feedback from other players: most of them told him they would invest in the firepower no matter what.

Anyway, best thing about his proposal that i found and included in mine too is a shared pool for firepower branches: invest X in one and get to invest X in the others free of skillpoint charge. This proposal alone must have been heard by the company that desperately wants to combat boating and cannot find the solution to achieve it.

[Ultimax]

Pjwned, on 11 March 2017 - 09:08 PM, said:

So I tried to find this proposal after somebody else wrote a long a post frequently sucking off this idea for how supposedly great it was, and...



I don't need to read or watch any further, this is stupid and not any better than what PGI has made.

Not that PGI's skill tree is good either, but right away this idea is worse.

In what way is it worse?

This is a method that allows PGI to:

1) Tweak available firepower nodes based on each mech's power without affecting the rest of the skill tree.
2) Allows us to have more than one viable weapon load out on one mech without Respec.
3) Allows for mechs using 2 or 3 weapon types to not be filled by the skill system.

I feel some people either didn't actually listen/read or simply didn't comprehend it.

Edited by Ultimax, 12 March 2017 - 08:52 PM.

[Oldbob10025]

Genius my friend... This I would back 105%

[Pjwned]

Ultimax, on 12 March 2017 - 11:59 AM, said:

In what way is it worse?

This is a method that allows PGI to:

1) Tweak available firepower nodes based on each mech's power without affecting the rest of the skill tree.
2) Allows us to have more than one viable weapon load out on one mech without Respec.
3) Allows for mechanical using 2 or 3 weapon types to not be filled by the skill system.

I feel some people either didn't actually listen/read or simply didn't comprehend it.

1) There shouldn't be guaranteed skill points for weapons, even if there's less overall skill points as a result; if you want weapon skills then you can give something else up.

2) Arbitrary firepower skill point allotment is all but certain to be a nightmare to deal with, both for PGI to actually handle correctly and for players to actually deal with what they have without obsessive whining and crying for more firepower skill points on their pet mech; this already happens enough with the current quirk system and anything that even resembles something to put a damper on that crap is automatically worthwhile.

The firepower tree shouldn't be some special snowflake that works differently from everything else, so even if PGI's skill tree is not that good it's still better than this proposal.

I would say that ultimately the best way to deal with these problems is to just get rid of the skill tree entirely, but I know that's not going to happen.

[Khobai]

rather than everyone having the same skill tree id rather see the skill tree subdivided into different roles.

players would have to choose one of three roles for each mech: command/support, strike/assault, or recon/skirmisher and based on the chosen role that would determine what skills you would have access to. Although some skills would be generic and all three roles would have access to them.

That would help promote rolewarfare/teamwork as well as make it impossible to min/max the skilltree. it changes the current skill tree from a min/max cookie cutter fiasco into an actual skill tree where choices are meaningful and have a profound effect on how a mech gets played.

Quote

I would say that ultimately the best way to deal with these problems is to just get rid of the skill tree entirely, but I know that's not going to happen.

theres nothing wrong with having a skill tree but it needs to force tough choices on the player. it needs to make them give up something in order to gain something.

having to choose one of three roles for example means giving up the skills of the two other roles.

Edited by Khobai, 12 March 2017 - 11:55 PM.

[Gattsus]

My only concern is boating, instead of contributing to making a bit more diverse builds, it would achieve the complete opposite. I'll side with pgi's implementation of the weapons skill tree.

Edited by Gattsus, 12 March 2017 - 11:56 PM.

[Cyrilis]

This is great work! Thank you very much for that!!!
Lets hope, this has the power to influence the 'final endgame plan' that seems to be persued by PGI

[Svetodav]

Great work.

If this thing will be implemented, i'll buy three mechpacks.

[Cyrilis]

POLL! POLL! POLL!