18 replies to this topic

[AngrySpartan]

I am still amazed and thrustrated that some of the community members still pushes STree as it is, cause I am struggling to find any advantages it has over current system (except rule of 3 removal). So I'd like to ask all of the supporters of new tree and other players:

"What does it offer to you? What advantages new Skill Tree design has over current Skills+Modules+Quirks mechanics?"

Edit: To be clear - engine decoupling and refunds are not part of this discussion.

Couple of my thoughts on it:
1. Yes, rule of 3 removal is welcomed
2. Yes, you may call it a steeper progression (45k*91 versus 15+mn C-Bills for a module set) though it's still debatable.
3. NO, new skill tree does not provide any meaningfull choices, instead it provides an illusion of choices. There are certain skills that will be pursued anyway (armor, structure, Radar derp, etc.) and the only choice is "What poison to pick (what junk nodes I'll tolerate) before receiving what I want?"
4. Yes, it's a PTS and the STree is not finished, bla bla bla. There are things in the core design of the tree which will not be fixed (like spiderweb abomination we still have). And knowing PGI track record it's not likely anything will be fixed the way it should.
5. Change for a sake of change or to shake things up is not a valid argument. Especially if that change opens a huge can of worms.

Speaking of worms...just some of the problems new skill tree brings:
1. Ruined mech balance
2. All sort of messy things related to 5 consumables slots
3. Mech nerf across the board (this is debatable though)
4. Unintuitive and just scary for many people interface (anyone else hates hexagons?)
5. Grind
7. 91 clicks of doom and all the time wasted, while being lost in the spiderweb (lack of) structure

Thus I am sincerely curious if I am missing something. What else does it have to justify it's existense?

Edited by AngrySpartan, 28 April 2017 - 01:28 AM.

[FupDup]

AngrySpartan, on 27 April 2017 - 03:31 PM, said:

1. Yes, rule of 3 removal is welcomed

Technically speaking we don't "need" the new skill tree to have the rule of 3 removed. PGI is packaging them together, but there is no physical coding limitation that prevents the current system from also removing it.

[AngrySpartan]

FupDup, on 27 April 2017 - 03:35 PM, said:

Technically speaking we don't "need" the new skill tree to have the rule of 3 removed. PGI is packaging them together, but there is no physical coding limitation that prevents the current system from also removing it.

Completely agree with that. To me that's another nail in the coffin of PTS skill tree build.

[oldradagast]

What does it offer?

Nothing at all.

It is a sadly obvious attempt to substitute GRIND for CONTENT.

[50 50]

AngrySpartan, on 27 April 2017 - 03:31 PM, said:

I am still amazed and thrustrated that some of the community members still pushes STree as it is, cause I am struggling to find any advantages it has over current system (except rule of 3 removal). So I'd like to ask all of the supporters of new tree and other players:

"What does it offer to you? What advantages new Skill Tree design has over current Skills+Modules+Quirks mechanics?"

Couple of my thoughts on it:
1. Yes, rule of 3 removal is welcomed
2. Yes, you may call it a steeper progression (45k*91 versus 15+mn C-Bills for a module set) though it's still debatable.
3. NO, new skill tree does not provide any meaningfull choices, instead it provides an illusion of choices. There are certain skills that will be pursued anyway (armor, structure, Radar derp, etc.) and the only choice is "What poison to pick (what junk nodes I'll tolerate) before receiving what I want?"
4. Yes, it's a PTS and the STree is not finished, bla bla bla. There are things in the core design of the tree which will not be fixed (like spiderweb abomination we still have). And knowing PGI track record it's not likely anything will be fixed the way it should.
5. Change for a sake of change or to shake things up is not a valid argument. Especially if that change opens a huge can of worms.

Speaking of worms...just some of the problems new skill tree brings:
1. Ruined mech balance
2. All sort of messy things related to 5 consumables slots
3. Mech nerf across the board (this is debatable though)
4. Unintuitive and just scary for many people interface (anyone else hates hexagons?)
5. Grind
7. 91 clicks of doom and all the time wasted, while being lost in the spiderweb (lack of) structure

Thus I am sincerely curious if I am missing something. What else does it have to justify it's existense?

Personally I am looking foward to being able to setup up mechs with bonuses relevant to the weapons I want to use on them and the role I might use them for.
Or in some cases, actually having bonuses. (Though that is something else to discuss)

Going to chat about your other items as well.
1. Didn't mind the rule of 3 myself. While it did feel painful to progress through some variants, I understood the concept there. Getting to know the basics of one mech variant as a pilot, then learning the basics on 2 others before being able to progress a bit further was like understanding the basics for that mech chassis. That said, I'll enjoy the tree and not having to take that approach but will still probably get the variants anyway.
2. Meh. For a new starter initially unlocking 91 nodes for just over 4 mil c-bills instead of having what might have been a hidden cost with the modules seems acceptable. That cost will obviously increase should a player wish to unlock more, but it's all very visible and upfront. The only thing you then need to worry about is the equipment changes on the mech.
3. I'll agree with this from the point of view that being able to allocate 91 points reduces how meaningful those choices are. Right now, can pretty much get anything I want regardless of what nodes I have to go through to get them and then just keep on getting more. I would be quite happy if we streamlined the tree and were able to pick exactly what we wanted but we should only have 50 points we can allocate. That will make those choices meaningful, will make our selection have real consequences and therefore give mechs points of differences and different roles on the battlefield.
4. Not worried.
5. Usually, but the current status quo is to get the mech with the best quirks, master it to make it better, add on modules to make it even better. If that gets dialed down and our fights become a bit grittier, that's fine. We can all adjust to getting a bit less damage and lower scores or what ever.

Worms:
1. If this is about the removal of the offensive quirks, maybe. What I am seeing is that these adjustments are getting moved onto the skills and then can be dealt with on the individual weapons (which is easier than managing 500+ mechs) The differences between the Clan and IS trees may not be that much on face value but when applied to the weapons where the base lines are different it might be more noticeable. Not sure.
2. Not sure what the problem is here. I'm actually thinking we could expand on the consumables and use this as an opportunity introduce some new options.
3. Meaning the Engine Decoupling? I think this is really good. Tried out a bunch of different mechs last night with no skill enhancements. Only had the Urbie for a light and it felt quite responsive, no real difference from what I could tell. Upped that to the Ice Ferret which as a 45 ton mech felt fast and agile. Didn't turn as tightly perhaps but felt like I wouldn't need to do anything with it. Same for the other mediums. The Heavies for the clans were really interesting as most have the same top speed. A Maddog felt about the same, still fairly responsive but as I worked up through the tonnages and got up to a Timberwolf the performance was more noticeable. The Timberwolf really felt like a 75 ton mech and it's turn rate felt quite different. Same for the accel and decel. I've always thought the mech felt like it was overly agile for it's size, this change made it feel like it is a bigger mech. With the Assaults, due to low top speeds there really wasn't much difference. The way they moved and were a bit slow to get started and slow down felt a bit more like the mechs handled in earlier MechWarrior titles. They felt like big war machines. I liked it.
4. Found it pretty easy to use and navigate personally... and I like hexes.
5. Grind..... given the way the refund is setup, even if the modules instead go back to a c-bill refund.... with all the points and available general XP/C-bills... what grind? But that's old player talk. New player, meh, not really. Given you could now just stick with your 4 starting mechbays and only ever have 4 mechs that you level up it's not overly significant. Then again, I'm not keen on the 91 points and would like that reduced significantly so that would affect the grind. It's really just if you want to keep going on more mechs or unlock more than you can allocate.
6. Yeah. 91 clicks is a fair bit. If the structure was more streamlined we could use a 'click on level 5 to allocate 5 points and max that skill'. I can see why the drag approach is nice but doesn't work in a screen that you can also drag around. Having a couple of options to filter and then allocate by the filter might be a good addition. eg. Filter to laser nodes. Click to allocate max available points. Save.
I can see a few UI benefits from having a different structure but didn't have any problems with spending some time reworking my favourite mechs or navigating through. Not going to be doing them all at once mind you. Just when I want to.... I probably only use about 1/4 of what I have anyway.

[AngrySpartan]

50 50, on 27 April 2017 - 07:11 PM, said:

Personally I am looking foward to being able to setup up mechs with bonuses relevant to the weapons I want to use on them and the role I might use them for.
Or in some cases, actually having bonuses. (Though that is something else to discuss)
,,,

Quote above - that's not any different from modules (there are no duration/velocity, etc. modules, but whatever).

Following your arguments:

Spoiler

1. Rule of 3 is not that of advantage in new ST as far as I get
2. Yep, as I said steeper progress is debatable, and when you have a set of modules you don't obliged to buy another one. That's a so-so advantage indeed.
3. We agree that skill tree doesn't give you chouces, isn't that a sign that it fails to achieve it's goal? Isn't that a sign that it should be further developed?
4. Hell, you should be worried! Last time PGi fixed something in time was Minimapocalypse. And it required massive outcry by the players to fix a relatively minor UI change. How long would it take to fix something so massive and inflexible as a interconnected skill tree?
5. I don't get your point here. Are you saying that you're tired of current mech levelling? "I want something new" is hardly a good argument to me if that "new" makes things worse than before.

Worms:

Spoiler

1. It's about making best mechs even better and worst mechs being stripped from their quirks. And no, it's still easier to buff single underperforming mech, than changing baseline stats - it will not affect other mechs, whereas baseline stats will.
2. Some examples: -200k C-bills per match if you want to get all from your mech, who needs coolrun if you can have multiple coolshots always ready, indefinite arty/air strikes, etc. I assume comp play balance might suffer as well, but I am not onto such things.
3. No, engine decoupling has nothing to do with that and a whole separate topic (in fact it deserves separate PTS, but PGi do PGI things as usual). It's about mech skill tree not providing the same bonuces it provides now. That's debatable though as I said before, but still it's a common argument I've seen of the forums
4. I am too lazy to find and provide every link for the topics started by new players on PTS forums, and not many new players will even bother to download PTS client. I'll give you one . There are lots of similar posts and topics on page 2-3 of pts. And here's the example of good interface with hundreds of skillpoints:

And here's PTS skill tree:

That's so sad that people can't tell the difference.
5. 45k*91=4mn C-Bills. Cost of a single module, so of, it's kinda fine in short terms.
6. Smoother wording doesn't change the fact that UI is terrible. As you said it needs work.

I am still not seing convincing arguments how new skill tree is better than what we have now from your post.

Edited by AngrySpartan, 28 April 2017 - 01:09 AM.

[Khobai]

it offers the ability for PGI to potentially steal billions of cbill value from peoples accounts and reset their bottom line.

[AngrySpartan]

12 hours since I posted this topic and there is no solid arguments why new Skill tree is good.

Where are you White Knights? So far, there are many reasons NOT to proceed with PGI's skill tree design and hardly any logic reasons to do so Share your insights please, I am sincerely curious.

Edited by AngrySpartan, 28 April 2017 - 04:28 AM.

[Admiral-Dan]

oldradagast, on 27 April 2017 - 05:05 PM, said:

What does it offer?

Nothing at all.

Nah, it has so many things to offer

• A new Point&Click Mini-Game called “Skill Maze”
  
• Much higher costs to Master a Mech
  
• Newly introduced respec costs
  
• 5 Consumables for much more Arti&Air Strikes in your games and of course as a C-Bill sink

To sum it up:
much more fun through grind, grind, grind

[Amsro]

Yep, I like the overall nerf to the game, engine decouple.

But the skill tree as is doesn't do what they set out to do.

So that in itself is a win by PGI. Consistently missing the mark since 2012.

[Lightfoot]

Not much, you can focus on one element of Mech functionality a bit better. Min-maxing.

I always thought the whole point of the new Skill system was to extend the ability to advance a favorite mech but that really has not changed so I will continue to request higher levels of advancement. It would keep players interested in playing and make a higher hill to climb, but grant better abilities for those who want to compete to climb the hill. MWO is so easy to level in currently, it needs better rewards to drive pilots to chase them. I thought that was the reason for the new Skill Trees.

[MrMagoo421]

The old system really wasn't a skill system. It was a grind to baseline. I considered all mechs borked until finishing the tree to bring them to parity and nothing more. Meaning that for any individual mech to be playable I had to buy 3, then sell the 2 I didn't want just to have the one I wanted perform at the baseline with everyone else.

I don't think the new system is perfect, but the old system could have been simply disabled for all it added to the game.

[AngrySpartan]

MrMagoo421, on 28 April 2017 - 08:37 AM, said:

The old system really wasn't a skill system. It was a grind to baseline. I considered all mechs borked until finishing the tree to bring them to parity and nothing more. Meaning that for any individual mech to be playable I had to buy 3, then sell the 2 I didn't want just to have the one I wanted perform at the baseline with everyone else.

I don't think the new system is perfect, but the old system could have been simply disabled for all it added to the game.

That's definetely fresh view of an old system, though I don't see much difference with the new one - your mech will still be borked until you grind it. Thats still be a grind to the new baseline, since there is still no real choices to be made.

And your last point regarding disabling, I'll consider it an advantage if you'll ask me. It doesn't mess with the fun factor of MWO, it doesn't mess with the balance of MWO.

Finally, as FupDup mentioned above here - rule of three can be disabled in the current system as well, so that's not an advantage of the new skill tree actually. It's just a cherry on a pile of hmm...'natural fertilizers'.

Edited by AngrySpartan, 28 April 2017 - 09:57 AM.

[MrMagoo421]

It is a build to diversity though. Not every player is going to have exactly the same skills. I don't in any way think the new system is perfect, I do think it's a step up from what we had. What we had has always looked and felt like a place-holder until they brought in an actual skill system.

[AngrySpartan]

MrMagoo421, on 28 April 2017 - 10:23 AM, said:

It is a build to diversity though. Not every player is going to have exactly the same skills.

You think so? Well, I will agree on that - everyone will pick their own poison (junk nodes) on the way to what they actually want (Radar derp, Armor&structure and whatever else will be considered meta nodes). I can't see any other meaningfull choices to be made.

To be thorough it will likely be a problem in almost any kind of a skill tree in MWO - the game lacks interesting mechanics except pew-pew. It's like cooking, you need to have ingridients first.

MrMagoo421, on 28 April 2017 - 10:23 AM, said:

I don't in any way think the new system is perfect, I do think it's a step up from what we had. What we had has always looked and felt like a place-holder until they brought in an actual skill system.

Unfortunately that's a step up right into the waste dump. There are so many issues in that system and so little (none!) advantages that it is not worth it in it's current state. In fact noone in this topic has managed to give at least single convincing argument why new skill tree is good and what it can do, what current system can not.

It needs work, I mean WORK, from the very bottom of it's design foundation.

[AngrySpartan]

PTS2 is over and yet there is no answer for the question in the opening post. New skill tree does nothing I am aware of to compensate for the problems it causes

I sincerely hope that PGi will learn some lessons from the feedback received across the forum and reddit and etc., though it's hardly a plausiible outcome.

PS. PGI, can you surprise me? Please?

[testhero]

Lightfoot, on 28 April 2017 - 08:30 AM, said:

Not much, you can focus on one element of Mech functionality a bit better. Min-maxing.

I always thought the whole point of the new Skill system was to extend the ability to advance a favorite mech but that really has not changed so I will continue to request higher levels of advancement. It would keep players interested in playing and make a higher hill to climb, but grant better abilities for those who want to compete to climb the hill. MWO is so easy to level in currently, it needs better rewards to drive pilots to chase them. I thought that was the reason for the new Skill Trees.

Never saw that reason mentioned or even hinted at in any post from the dev. team at all.

A constantly extending the ability to reach higher levels of advancement well that sounds nice,
So I can take that 3.5 million xp on my catapult-A! and spend it to go to level 100 Hmmm sounds like a role playing game Unfortunately if I could get continuing meaning full advancement It would be a little hard on the level 1 new player who my skill set would utterly destroy in a couple of salvos.
Played that in a couple of other online games and it bites on the losing end and isn't much long term fun on the winning end either.
In MWO the "pilot skills" have to be an enhancement to your own real game playing skills rather than potentially superseding them.

Rereading this post. It reads as sarcasm Sorry. I am trying to get across that this game needs a different balance between the Character/mech skills and the player's own physical skills than other types of games. Many fps/simulation do well with no kind of skill system at all.

Edited by testhero, 28 April 2017 - 04:22 PM.

[Dr Cara Carcass]

Khobai, on 28 April 2017 - 01:31 AM, said:

it offers the ability for PGI to potentially steal billions of cbill value from peoples accounts and reset their bottom line.

Yeah i should get about 1 billion in cbills from module refund - fund 117 mill on th pts - thats at leats 850 million gone....

[Lightfoot]

testhero, on 28 April 2017 - 04:21 PM, said:

Never saw that reason mentioned or even hinted at in any post from the dev. team at all.

A constantly extending the ability to reach higher levels of advancement well that sounds nice,
So I can take that 3.5 million xp on my catapult-A! and spend it to go to level 100 Hmmm sounds like a role playing game Unfortunately if I could get continuing meaning full advancement It would be a little hard on the level 1 new player who my skill set would utterly destroy in a couple of salvos.
Played that in a couple of other online games and it bites on the losing end and isn't much long term fun on the winning end either.
In MWO the "pilot skills" have to be an enhancement to your own real game playing skills rather than potentially superseding them.

Rereading this post. It reads as sarcasm Sorry. I am trying to get across that this game needs a different balance between the Character/mech skills and the player's own physical skills than other types of games. Many fps/simulation do well with no kind of skill system at all.

I agree. You can't have mechs becoming godly, but even on my 8 month old Alt, every mech I have mastered has 91 to 120 nodes unlockable. I haven't spent my SP and XP and HXP to zero though, maybe it's harder at zero. I just couldn't imagine doing all the things to create a new Skill tree without making the game RP grind deeper though. Considering I can completely master a new mech on a weekend, I can't conceive of a player saying it's hard to do. Skilling Modules takes more time, but most Modules are fluff.