4 replies to this topic

[50 50]

Ok, so the information is up for the new tech to be introduced on July 18th and I have a few questions.

Some of the items look like they might either need some unique skill nodes, or may benefit from other nodes that may be related.
For example:
The Rotary Autocannons have a jam chance and a spin up/down time.
Would they have their own nodes or would they be affected by the UAC jam chance and gauss charge up nodes?

Similarly for the laser AMS.
Would it be affected by the laser nodes as well as the AMS nodes?

Stealth armour.
Will the ECM nodes affect it?

I had thought that If we keep the web design shown in in PTS 1 and PTS 2 and new skills needed that it would be difficult to fit them in without re-arranging the web and potentially causing some problems.
In a simpler design where the cross over is not as complex and we have a more linear view I would think it would be easier to add in new skills as we move along.

However, I firmly believe we have far too many points and need perhaps 50 at most.
A reduction in the points will mean we can have a simpler design and it will mean that our choices are significant as we will miss out on other options.
Having some cross over requirements to give some of the paths a bit of bulk is still good if they are meaningful.

For example, needing to get at least a couple of levels of Sensor Range before Seismic; getting a couple of levels of fall damage reduction with increased armour and internal structure.
Things like that.

Having some cross over does mean that investing in a tree requires some commitment of points which makes the choices significant.

Speaking of new skills, will we see nodes for the Active Probes and MASC?

[oldradagast]

I think, if anything, the new tech proves that the skill system needs to be kept simple. If they are going to start adding even more nodes into their existing system to give new tech special powers, we'll end up having to pick 113 nodes out of 300 or some silly thing.

Create and focus on Roles, keep the skill system simple, and - IMHO - avoid weapon specific only skills. For example, we don't need a jam-chance reduction skill for each version of UAC's, or one for UAC's and one for rotary autocannons. Just roll it in as a bonus to some generic "ballistic buff" skill. This reduces the staggering size of the skill tree and the amount of time (and resources) wasted respecing things because you changed a few guns on your mech.

[Athom83]

50 50, on 14 March 2017 - 02:03 PM, said:

Speaking of new skills, will we see nodes for the Active Probes and MASC?

Probes are effected by sensor range, and MASC by mobility skills.

To the rest of the post; It would be easier than you think. You can combine related weapon modules into the same skills. A LB-X skill would affect all LB-X weapons, UAC affects all UACs, Std laser skills affect std lasers, etc. The RACs, ERLs, HLs (and eventually HAGs) should have their own skills as they are their own weapons, and stealth armor skills should have its own place (probably in survivability). Although, it may be easier (and preferred) to have the "jam chance" skills affect all weapons with a jam chance. I agree that we have far too many points to pick from, be we also have a lot of space we can add them to. The laser ams should benefit from ams overload.

The name of the (new) game was going to be about sacrificing one thing to get another. Personally, I dislike the "linear" skill trees and prefer the webbed ones. That doesn't mean I was perfectly happy with the current layout though.

[50 50]

There are some specific skills that could be applied to Active Probes and MASC.
As the Active Probes can defeat ECM there could be nodes that enhance this aspect.
For MASC there is the damage it deals and the recharge time, both of which could be nodes to enhance the equipment.

I also found when doing the tests that MASC provides that instant accel and decel bonus making it a significant advantage with the mobility decoupling. Didn't do anything for turning so there was no direct bonus in taking the mobility enhancements with how MASC operated. Might even suggest that they are not worth taking if you have MASC.

Are we also missing a target acquisition speed for sensors that would enhance streak and LRM lock on speed?
Possibly also the Sensor Information Sharing range that was in the InfoWar tests?

Is TAG affected by the laser/range nodes? (If not... should it be?)

I agree there could be some overlap of nodes for some of these new weapons, others might need some new options added.
However it would make sense to have UAC Jam chance be adjusted to 'Reduced Jam Chance' so it is applicable for both the UAC and the RAC. That sort of thing would make sense. The rest of it is managed on the item itself as it might appear that the UAC jams when trying to double tap, but the RAC might jam if fired for too long.

@OldRadagast
I hear what your saying.
I feel that by reducing the number of points we can get we will end up with mechs fitting into roles without the need to actually limit player choice by picking a role first.
Having that freedom to pick and choose the nodes we want to invest in will mean that within a role we can have a lot of variations.
There might be some Archetypes that could be used as a guide, but no set rules that lock us into one path.... which if we decided to change that path would mean doing a full respec.

For example:
We might say that the typical Scout Archetype would have the full sensor tree. But after that... who knows. One player might like the idea of taking the additional UAV and Strategic Strike nodes and really filling that role of being a spotter. Another might like to be a bit more of a hunter and put their points into weapons.

Simplify the tree more than what it was under PTS 2.
Make sure it can expand easily if it needs to.

Edited by 50 50, 14 March 2017 - 06:02 PM.

[50 50]

So... I've been pondering over the web design for the skill tree, particularly in regards to the firepower tree and as I've looked over it I can see how hard it is to actually get a design that balances one of the branches vs another, balances a generic amount of skills suitable for a mixed load vs a boated design and is also interesting to use and look at.

In total there were 73 nodes.

There are essentially 3 core skills that every weapon uses.
Cool down
Range
Heat Reduction.

Velocity could also be considered a core skill as it affects ballistics, missiles and the PPC.

With the design that was, without picking up any weapon specific skills, you could get:
Range 5
Velocity 5
Heat 3
Cooldown 2
A 15 point investment.

If that's all I wanted to do to buff all 3 weapon types without getting anything specific, that's a fairly minimal investment to get some bonuses.

If I picked up Magazine Capacity 1 and 2, for two more points I got access to:
+2 Range
+3 Cooldown
For a mixed build load out, that's still a pretty good investment for another 7 points.

If I pick up Missile Rack 1 and Missile Spread 1 I get access to:
+2 Cooldown
+2 Heat
+1 Range
Once again, for a mixed loadout, that's a pretty good investment for another 7 points.

Picking up Laser Duration 1 and 2 unlocks:
+1 Range
+1 Cooldown
+1 Heat
That's 5 points worth.

For an additional Laser Duration 3 it unlocks:
+2 Cooldown
+1 Heat
Another 6 points.

With a little bit of delving into some of the weapon specific nodes for a total of 7 points, you can buff the core skills up to:
Range 9
Velocity 5
Heat 7
Cooldown 10
A total investment of 38 points.
It would be prudent to consider not delving into some of those additional paths depending on how many hard points of that type the mech may have.

However, going back to the base 15 point investment, if we look at builds that do boat a weapon type we can start to see how that balances in terms of the point investment.

For a Ballistic build you would probably get those initial 15 nodes.
If I picked up Magazine Capacity 1 and 2, for two more points I got access to:
+2 Range
+3 Cooldown
For another 7 points you can have all the generic skills that will work for any ballistic weapon.
These 7 points also allow full access to any of the specific balistic weapon skills or which there are 5 of each.
If you only took one type of ballistic weapon, the total point investment might be 27 points.
To maximize the Gauss Rifle Charge actually requires the least investment at a total of 20 points
Lbx Spread 23 points
UACs Jam chance also 23 points

For a Missile build we take that same start with 15 nodes and go down the middle of the tree.
We can actually add an additional 18 nodes that would be relevant to missiles.
+3 Cooldown
+2 Heat
+1 Range
And we max out the missile specific skills at:
Missile Spread 5
High Explosive 5
Missile Rack 2
That's a total investment of 33 points.

For a Laser boat it varies a little.
You don't need the Velocity skills for the lasers but to pick up the core skills you would end up investing in several levels.
The laser tree goes down the left hand side and if we only look at allocating to those nodes specifically we get:
Laser Duration 10
Range 4
Cooldown 5
Heat 5
That's a total investment of 24 points.
While you can avoid a couple of the velocity nodes, to get the core skills requires a significant investment on top.

The interesting one is a PPC boat.
The Laser Duration nodes will not be effective so unless you did want to unlock some of those additional nodes you can stick to the 15 core nodes and have a minimal investment.

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So to sum up this analysis, with the layout as it was in PTS 2, there is a balance in terms of what we might consider a minimum investment of points between what we might get for a mixed build compared to what we might take with a boated build:
Mixed build 15 points.
Laser Build 24 points.
PPC build 15 points.
Ballistic build 27 points.
Missile build 33 points.

The Missile tree comes out looking the most expensive but we should also consider that missile weapons are generally light, small, heat efficient and high damage weapons.
Boating a specific ballistic weapon is a fairly clean investment.
Boating lasers or alternatively PPCs can also be fairly straight foward but may also require investing in some potentially unnecessary nodes to get access to more skills.
Without pushing too heavily into the weapon specific skills, a mixed build can compare quite well and it will really depend on how far we individually want to invest into the firepower tree.


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This is where I feel we really need to look at how many points we can have in total. If I am going to invest around 22 points on average into the fire power tree, there are a lot of left over points to invest in pretty much everything else.
If we want the under performing mechs to have a better chance, then investing anything into the fire power tree needs to mean I cannot invest heavily in all other areas as well.

There are 22 points in the Armour Structure tree.
40 in Agility
20 in Jump Jets
25 in Mech operations
and 22 in Miscellaneous
With the 73 in the fire power tree we have a total of 202 nodes.
With 91 skill points to split over these trees I can get half of all of the nodes.
Where is the choice?
That will be everything I would want to get and probaby a few extras.
Sure some of those skills can be seen as fillers but I've got so many skill points to burn it's not even a waste. I get some bonus skill and still get everything.

The underperforming mechs will only be able to catch up if the over performers, the top tier combat chassis, have to sacrifice something to keep that high combat efficiency. Only then will we start to see some of these additional roles develop.

To really make a difference we should significantly reduce the points can have. I'm going to suggest 50 points max as that's 1/4 of the total nodes. Only then can we consider repositioning some of those 'filler' nodes so we can be more efficient in our selections, but this need only apply to something like the Mech operations and agility trees.
We can always add more points to spend, but reducing that maximum has it's problems.

Edited by 50 50, 23 March 2017 - 06:31 PM.