655 replies to this topic

[Nathaniel Fortescue]

I found out that trying to custom build a mech, as per original rules does not necessarily makes it better designed than the original one youre trying to modify.

Reminds me of a friend that would, in every game that allowed it, try to heavily modify his vehicles, up to removing LIFE SUPPORT SYSTEMS from a spaceship to make room for his Planet Killer Disruptor Energy Cannon. Two combat turns later everything that could malfunction due to excessive jury rigging did. Much hilarity ensued, but the playing session was effectively killed by this.

[Fyrwulf]

Nathaniel Fortescue, on 09 January 2012 - 04:50 PM, said:

I found out that trying to custom build a mech, as per original rules does not necessarily makes it better designed than the original one youre trying to modify.

Exactly this. A lot of people think this is going to be like the previous MW games, where there's only a passing resemblance to the TT game. When I say there is literally a mech for every role, it's literally true. To build a mech according to BT rules, you have to know how you pilot your mech, you have to be intimately familiar with how the weapons behave in BT, and you have to realize that the most powerful mech from a pure stat perspective isn't necessarily going to beat the best balanced mech.

In BT, your mech doesn't shut down if you have a design that's too hot, your pilot either roasts himself to death or the reactor pops like a big zit if you aren't careful. If you have a missile boat and you try to mix it up with a balanced design, you're toast unless you can take the other pilot out fast. If you have a mech that's heavy on ballistics, you need to conserve your ammo or you're going to be piloting a very expensive target. Oh yeah, and jump jets are an enhancement to maneuverability, not an excuse to imitate a poptart.

[Tail Gunner]

Well i guess i will have a dabble at this...Hmm id hate to develop a new game and have it "limited" right out of the shoot..Id hate to buy a new game and be "stuck" with only 8 meks....4 big one's 4 little ones's...lasers away...Now thats a real challenge. Gonna keep this simple...the m3 lab was a never ending source of amazement ...Try a scat doing 186 kph in the city map loaded with 8 srm 10's. You had to be on the fly to shoot...no armor so a streak could pop you Or a Bushwacker with 3 20's that could pop a annihilator at will...Yes Up date m3 it was beyond its time then. It just lacked map support. And yes it had a room for the stock fan boys....and the ice fan boys...unlimited ua...etc etc

God that was a game....Hmm you could leave the lag out of it however


Cry Havoc let slip the dogs of war...

Edited by Tail Gunner, 09 January 2012 - 05:45 PM.

[Zervziel]

I was quite sure that one of the things that made Omnimechs so unique was that pretty much any weapon pod replace another pod as long as they had enough tonnage to allow for that. Outside of omnis, I actually DON'T want that. It's perfectly fine switching one laser for another energy weapon of similar size and weight, it's another entirely to rip it out and some how cram an autocannon in it's place. Heck it would ruin the unique feel for alot of mechs. I mean watching someone running around with a laser boat King Crab, a traditionally ballistic heavy mech would just feel wrong. Customization is a good thing, but it definitely needs to be reigned in. Allow the player to have some customization but not too much. Otherwise what would be the point of having certain chassis if the only advantage of doing so is simply pure aesthetics.

[Wolvers]

Zervziel, on 09 January 2012 - 10:02 PM, said:

I was quite sure that one of the things that made Omnimechs so unique was that pretty much any weapon pod replace another pod as long as they had enough tonnage to allow for that. Outside of omnis, I actually DON'T want that. It's perfectly fine switching one laser for another energy weapon of similar size and weight, it's another entirely to rip it out and some how cram an autocannon in it's place. Heck it would ruin the unique feel for alot of mechs. I mean watching someone running around with a laser boat King Crab, a traditionally ballistic heavy mech would just feel wrong. Customization is a good thing, but it definitely needs to be reigned in. Allow the player to have some customization but not too much. Otherwise what would be the point of having certain chassis if the only advantage of doing so is simply pure aesthetics.

Omnimechs are still unique regardless of full customization, they can change their loadouts within half an hour from memory. Customization takes time, it's not something that can be done prior to, or even in the middle, of engagements. I think all the mechlabs in all the MW games made omni's effectively redundant.

What is your definitation of some customization?

[Ceefood]

an omni was meant to have replacements quicker whether that be from battle damage or a different loadout for the next mission.
IS mechs had longer repair times & customisation was alot longer - days to weeks compared to hours but since the TT this was unimportant unless a GM ruled otherwise for their campaign.

in PC games
MW1 had no lab - no issue
MW2 was clan again no issue expansion never played
MW3 & expansions from my understanding it made the difference to omnis irrelevant so not a good thing but I never played so really cant comment properly without true experience
MW4 well that game was so far from BT rules it doesnt count IMHO as a true MW game but the lab was terrible & cant be compared to others

Althought I know you are not asking me for a definition but I will give mine - some customisation would be a set percent of the mech & no more can be changed. I would allow higher values for the lighter the mech say 50% light 40% med 25% heavy & 15% assault - also once you start changing those are the only components that could be changed again in the future.
eg rip out the engine & put a faster/slower one for more/less armour or weapons thats all you will change in future as well
eg rip out the mgs & ammo plus couple lasers & put in a large pulse thats all you will be able to change in future

[Dihm]

Just so people remember, this isn't MechWarrior 5. It is a new game that has MechWarrior in its name, it is a reboot. Expecting it to have a full MechLab because "all the other MechWarriors did!" is a bad expectation to have.

[Grithis]

I'm seeing a lot of posts saying that different parts/ weapons should just be able to plug in, with components and connectors being compatible, and such.

This is a laughable thought, considering that all companies have always had different ways of doing things and designing products.

You can't take parts off of a Ford and just slap them into a Chevy. Playstation games don't work in an Xbox. Vista doesn't run properly in.......anything! It just doesn't happen. If a factory didn't design something into a mech, it's obviously going to take at least some cutting and/ or welding to shoehorn something different in.

[Keylan Carlyle]

I am quite new here, but not new to BT-Universe.

Must be about 17 years ago when i startet the TT and read all of the IS and most of the clan novells.

When its about Battletech iam still a friend of the lostech timeline where most of the Planets in the IS got a steampunk feeling.

For me, most of the PC games gave far too mutch controll to the Player, as usualy he startet controling a whole lance and was allowed to buy mechs and weapony by themselves.

For MWO i would love to have more of a career system. As most mechwarriors you start in a combat unit with your one and only mech. Maybe its your famalies mech your father inherit to you. Or you just got this mech as a soldiers equipment.

Any modification on your mech should depend on the fraction you belong to and the rank you achieved. This way from time to time u get offers to change your mech or take a certain modification. But you should have a smal number of choises and this way they come come from a predifined set of results. So no scratchbuild options are available.

[Fyrwulf]

While I mostly agree with the above, there are some key differences. If you belong to a house unit, weapons that are common to your house should be relatively cheap. Any foreign weapons should carry the appropriate price tag. Full on, one-off variants you commission from Mech Magic Inc (since I refuse to believe they released that info for no purpose) should be treated as a brand new mech and priced as such. And when I say price, I mean a conversion rate of $1 = 1 million C-bills. That may sound expensive, but remember that according to the devs there is going to be one mech per account.

[Tail Gunner]

Some very indepth well articulated disscusion going on here....As to my blurb on m3. The game was endless in a sense of how the mech lab allowed the player to modify any mech that was chosen. There was a huge benefit to that...total imersion. No matter the type of battle one had to anticapte the battlefeild number of players and skill level's.One could bring a almost endless list of mechs to bear...it was a treat for all the skilled players. It took thought skill and practice to survive...Once again total immersion....Little ruff on the new pilots. I just cant begin to tell you how much diversity one could bring.

.....Personal experience...The Bushwacker total scout mech usless in any heavy combat however the mech was allowed a weight limit...engine limit and armor limit.Stripping down the armor...loading the bay's with 20'..(3) made it a high speed terror very effective with one caveat... get nicked and game over..Your piloting skill had to be exceptional. Skilled playes adapted there heavys to that type of attack and the game leveled out...With one huge difference the skill levels of all the pilots were being enhanced...again total immersion..I am sure it was funny to see a bushwacker running for its life on top of building's and a 90 ton avatar doing its best to end it..

Do some quick marketing right here on this forum...everyone is shouting out what they want...actually what intrest's them...the allure.

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Hmmm.... Strickly a opinion your milage may vary....Should have been there...Linear and discplined...Yes it was

[MacKoga]

Here are some concerns I've seen in this thread and why a robust mechlab should not be a problem:

"I don't think I'd be good at customizing," or "I'm not interested in customizing,"
Solution: That's fine. Play a stock or stock variant.


"I'm worried that everyone will play 100T long range sniping mechs"
Solution: The devs are solving this at least three different ways:

* First, they are making the terrain interesting, such as complex urban landscapes where opponents can sneak around, over, or through buildings. That solves a lot of things, importantly shifting the game to being about mech combat, instead of Revolutionary War era style firing lines on ridges shooting at max range.

* Second, they are making detection and counter measures a serious part of the game. This further mitigates the ridiculous design advantage, particularly in complex terrain.

* Third, they are designing game mechanics so that the other weight classes are useful. This suggests that reasons that lead the classic board game or book designs to be balanced might in some way show up as actual game mechanics. Past MW games did not do this.

The end result is that a strangely customized mech design should be significantly unbalanced, having one area where it shines, but likely vulnerable in multiple other areas as a trade-off. Unlike past MW games, those other areas should really matter.


"My mech is OMNI. That should mean something," or "I want mech variations to stay fairly classic, not swapping out an AC/10 for a million small lasers"
Solution: Despite its flaws, MW4 did a decent job of this. Besides tonnage restrictions, your weapons had to mount into weapon pods. Pods had a certain amount of space available, and some weapons took up too much space to fit into an area. But more important, weapon pods came in 4 different styles: missiles, guns, energy, or omni. All weapons and equipment was classified as one of the first three types. I'm sure that system could be improved upon, but it did seem like major progress towards providing some balance between customizability, old canon lore, and actual game play.

[Keylan Carlyle]

MacKoga, on 11 January 2012 - 01:14 AM, said:

Here are some concerns I've seen in this thread and why a robust mechlab should not be a problem:

Any kind of free customisation brings mechdesign down to the question if the chassi fit the role and can hold the faviorite type of the 3 best rated weapons.
Likewise in original BT TT rules and in MW-videogames autocannons (especialy small caliber) are raerly seen, as people always avois them. They chosse mechs without those guns, they take variants without those guns or the customise to get rid of those guns.

But if u got into BT-Universe by reading the novells u will know autocannons are the most common weapons on the IS battlefield.

They are set in half of the mechs (as they are especially set on common mechs) on most of the tanks and common for static defances and ground infantry.

The reason for this is that they are cheap, availabe and easy to maintain.

Unforunatly is very hard to represent in online games, as players wont fall in love with their jaeger mech (60t 2x AC2 2x m-laser light mech amour). They wont the best mech with the best weapons (mostly energy with missle support).

I know most people would hate it, but i would love to get one mech and have to get along with it. No choises. But this only benefits if everybody has to deal with it to keep the diversity i am looking for.

Get a mech and deal with it. If u lose it its gone, according to your rank u get another mech, still no choises (beside categorys like scout/combat/support). If u lose your mech frequently (non repaiable demolition) u loose rank.

I would love that

Unfortunatly (for me) not everybody feels this way.

[William White]

I am afrid complete scratch build would be so frightfully expensive that unless mummy and daddy had bilions of cbills liying about it would not be possible. I would like a mechlab to adjust current mechs but not to scratch build.

[Kephas]

if it dosen´t end up like "spore" i got no problem with designers and creators

[MaddMaxx]

Fyrwulf, on 10 January 2012 - 04:20 PM, said:

but remember that according to the devs there is going to be one mech per account.

Hate to ask but can you Link us to that Dev quote please.

[Black Sunder]

Fyrwulf, on 10 January 2012 - 04:20 PM, said:

but remember that according to the devs there is going to be one mech per account.

Link or it didn't happen.

[Fyrwulf]

MaddMaxx, on 11 January 2012 - 06:26 AM, said:

Hate to ask but can you Link us to that Dev quote please.

I believe it comes from one of the No Guts No Galaxy podcasts. Not sure which one.

[Dihm]

None of the devs were on those podcasts (yet anyway).

[MaddMaxx]

Dihm, on 11 January 2012 - 11:02 AM, said:

None of the devs were on those podcasts (yet anyway).

So it is like the "Salvage" angle everyone keeps on about. Both are unfounded rumors and unverified too.