28 replies to this topic

[Anunknownlurker]

@Currcu - I am still interested in the game, I've played it to a reasonable level for 3 years. I still watch streams and youtube posts about MWO and have a decent understanding of how the game works.

I will be playing Battletech (I was a kickstart contributor) when it is released. I've been playing mech games since MW3 and really enjoy stompy robots.

I gave "skill mess" a try and, for many reasons (some of which have been stated above by others and myself) I found it the nail in the coffin lid. I gave MWO another try when Civil War tech came out (see? I've played recently!) but it wasn't really enough to bring me back to the game.

I will continue to monitor the forum, watch streams and youtube to keep an eye on how the game progresses and if I see something that interests me or makes me think some positive change is incoming I will, hopefully, be back. I may even play a couple of games a week just to keep my eye in, I'm not sure yet.

So, just because someone doesn't play, it doesn't wholly invalidate their opinion, especially since the OP was looking for advice on a subject I felt I could help with i.e. the Skill Tree and Civil War tech, both of which I have some experience of.

Edited by Jimmy DiGriz, 26 July 2017 - 03:10 AM.

[pyrocomp]

Agent 0 Fortune, on 25 July 2017 - 07:18 PM, said:

I am not exaggerating the problem, and I don't think you understand "the problem".
The Problem is people who once played the game are put off by amount of effort required to reengage, especially players like myself who have well over a hundred mech, and enjoy playing a wide variety of chassis and builds.

And if you can "safely ignore the skill tree" why bother having it? It is complexity for the sake of complexity, which creates a barrier to entry for new and returning players.

Obviously I am not going to spend a lot of time debating it, if I was that concerned I would re-download the game and learn how to play from scratch. I just wanted to throw in my two cents on the downside of implementing a complexity grind-wheel.

This Skill Tree has it's downsides and most of them are what you describe. The reason why the skill tree is here is... most of it boild down to the 'more customization in devs opinion'. E.g. they see it this way. Their game, their choise. Again, if you do not want it, you as well may not touch it. Skills surely give a noticable bonus to whatever they boost but it is not decisive and way less than the previous skills system (with exception in sensors).

So again, I'm still under impression that statements 'I have 100 mechs and I'll die clicking them through' is an exaggeration. You normaly would play 6 matches per hour. How many mechs you would use? So you'll have to skill 2 or 3 max. There is no point in gereral 'gotta skill'em all'. Skill those you use now and go play. I had some mechs and after the first one I felt like you. After I thought carefully over why I should skill them right now I switch to playing the main game, not the maze minigame. So my advice still is 'chill and play, ignore the urge to skill all mech before the very first drop'.

And, if you stopped playing long ago, reaaallly long, why bothering with the game? New players find new Skill Tree ok (yes, I checked as I try to bring my friends here who are new to the franchise itself). Old players who play and own almost every chassis variant still play and mostly have little objection to it. All the fuss 'the new skill tree made me abandon the game' was ... how to say it without... well, the skill tree offended less people than any major balance patch. So while I get the point of your post I don't get you motivation and over it the overall idea of the discussion.

[Anunknownlurker]

@pyroromp - we can all give anecdotal examples, I know a number of new players who find skill tree a barrier to playing (both my sons for example and no, it was nothing to do with my personal views, they gave up listening to me years ago!).

Regarding players with a large stable of mechs; if, as you say "there is no point in general 'gotta skill them all'" isn't that a bit of a kick in the teeth to people who have spent years collecting, and playing, their mechs?

If, as you say, "skills give a noticeable bonus....but it's not decisive..." then what's the point in it?

Sorry, I'll stop here because I think we could easily hijack this thread and descend into skill tree "Red vs Blue" which has been covered ad nauseam in other posts.

Edited by Jimmy DiGriz, 26 July 2017 - 03:57 AM.

[pyrocomp]

KodiakGW, on 25 July 2017 - 05:37 PM, said:

He still needs to spend the time clicking the "60+ usual and a handful of mech-specific nodes" on all the mechs he wants to play. So, I wouldn't say he is exaggerating the problem. Would be nice if before they implemented this they listened to some others, besides the Skill Tree White Knights, who said to have a standard template that you could have applied to save on clicking.

Besides, isn't your point contrary to one of the White Knight selling points on making each skill tree unique for every mech? If 2/3+ of the nodes are going to be the same on every mech, leaves little to make one mech vastly different from another with skills.

He still needs 60+ clickson a mech he want's to play (about same number of clicks to change a build to a different one). There is no need to skill all mechs he has before the very first drop. Among my humble 30+ mechs I still have some unskilled. And not sure I'll skill them today, or this week, or this month. Do not see any point in must skill'em all right now attitude. You do not even have achivements, ranks, ways to put it on display to boast abou it. But this is beyound the current discussion.

Anyway, the last phrase, it seems, puts me into the Skill Tree White Knights bucket. Well no, the skill tree had better ways to be implemented and PTS discussions had numerous options. And yes, for general play (not sure about top comp team play) the skills do not offer normal customization as there is, let's call it pattern, of ~60 nodes that is universal and the best for each mech and situation.
This is to some point was expexcted as the nodes and subtrees were balanced but not the total patterns. Thus that was off the scope of optimization.

Partially offtopic: To some degree it can be said about the CW. The general IS-Clan balance goes over the unlimited QP drops data. The CW has tonnage restrictions. That forces the combinations in drops to be different as the rules for those combinations are different. Thus the set of optimal parameters is different. If the game was balance around CW rules, then the QP will get borked.
Same thing with skill trees - what was the thing that was optimized? By the devs statements aroung ST PTS it was general subtrees balance e.g. that each tree fully opened was equally usefull. This may be true, but people tend not to do so. And there is optimal mix of nodes. You can optimaze towards those options, but trees will get unequal. General optimization problem - you otimize set of parameters to get extremum (max of min) of predefined function (the estimator). Change the function and the system will seem unoptimized. Can't blame devs, the task is complex on any level.

[pyrocomp]

Jimmy DiGriz, on 26 July 2017 - 03:51 AM, said:

@pyroromp - we can all give anecdotal examples, I know a number of new players who find skill tree a barrier to playing (both my sons for example and no, it was nothing to do with my personal views, they gave up listening to me years ago!).

Regarding players with a large stable of mechs; if, as you say "there is no point in general 'gotta skill them all'" isn't that a bit of a kick in the teeth to people who have spent years collecting, and playing, their mechs?

If, as you say, "skills give a noticeable bonus....but it's not decisive..." then what's the point in it?

Sorry, I'll stop here because I think we could easily hijack this thread and descend into skill tree "Red vs Blue" which has been covered ad nauseam in other posts.

Pls, use 'Quote' button, it'll be easier to notice the replies.

No, I don't think the skill tree is a real barrier here. To get to it takes more time than to encounter unstable connection, trash talk and general staleness of matches on some maps and total lack of any in-game info on what does what and how it works. Plus T5 is strange. Like really strange. Tried to watch a friend of mine start playing. I wasn't able to understand what people were doing altogther. So no, I think skill tree is far down the list of the 'top new player offenders'.

What's the point in skills in a game where there is a player and not a character and franchise talks of centuries old stompy robots that are kept operational by the constant search the local junkyards for spare parts? And is there are simple modifications (as anyone can do it in the field) to those robots that allow those roboots to run faster and shoot farther then why that was not introduced to the production lines? The hell I know. Customization? Some goal in a total lack of campaing progress and all? Some weird economics? Anyway, don't think on it, the skilling mech is like skilling a race car. Yes, train and skill tour engine to run faster. Yes, by burning laps on a ring. Really, the mech skills in a FPS in its alienness to the franchise logic is next to the magic powerup and mech spells (not that there was no ghost mech abuility in Kell family).
From the gameplay point of view it allows some more customization. In ideal game - an edge if you get someone around your capabilities in a equal situation. But that is all you should get. In this game... well, I think some balance changes are up ahead, espcially with new tech now in game.

And to the last point... Having all the mechs still does not mean to have all mech skilled. And if it does... Don't get me wrong. If some player had a goal of collecting multiple mechs and skilling them - what changes now? If the main goal was to actually play them, then you rarely hop into more than 5 mechs during one evening, and to have those 5 different each evening?

[KodiakGW]

Curccu, on 26 July 2017 - 02:28 AM, said:

Why do people who will NEVER play this game again are still writing in this games forums, this has happened years already...
and then they give advice and opinions about new tech that they have never ever played with, because they NEVER play this game again...

Just wondering.

See his reply. I also know someone on my team who left due to the Skill Tree. They came back and checked things out. Were not impressed, and left again. There may be a lot out there doing the same.

Maybe these people who post know how long it took to get another Mechwarrior/Battletech title out there.

Maybe they want to see this title succeed knowing that, but know it won't the way it is.

Maybe they are trying to facilitate change to bring themselves and other players back. Change they discussed with others who left the game and said they would come back it implemented.

Maybe they are tired of seeing someone who fought really hard to get the Skill Tree implemented, who then only put in 13 games the season following because "they weren't feeling it" for the game, who had hundreds of games the season prior to it, and currently only have 40 games this season, continue to post about how good it is. Guess they aren't feeling it still.

Maybe they noticed the 2K drop in players who put in 10 games or more to get on the leaderboards the season after the Skill Tree was implemented. Maybe they also see that as of this writing, there were another 2K fewer players, when they though there would be a significant rise due to the new tech. Maybe they are concerned that this will be a trend. Oh, there were plenty of excuses why there was a drop last season. I can imagine what the excuses are going to be for this drop. One I'm sure we will hear is that "everyone moved over to FP for the event." Yes, "hundreds of returning players" never put in 10 games before the new tech was released, nor did they put in 10 games the 3 days before the event started to check it out. Then they stayed in FP despite all the threads we are seeing about FP not being enjoyed. Does that seem like a reasonable argument? I'm sure to some delusional people it does. Ones who "extrapolated" that 1400 players a day were joining just prior to the new tech. Which means there was a significant reduction in players joining post patch, because we should be closing in on 42,000 players with 10 games or more.

Instead of continuing defending it by saying "I'm dealing with it, you should too", maybe address that it is flawed. Maybe review ideas on how to fix it, and lend your voice to the ones you support. Maybe stop using the "rule of three" as an excuse for it being implemented because they could have changed that at any time.

"First step in solving any problem is recognizing there is one."

[Kyrie]

I've been a forum warrior for a while, largely out of disappointment with CW. I play the game occasionally, just not with the same passion.

I have no real opinion on the skill-tree, other than to recognize that it has some insidious aspects to drain c-bills and encourage payment. Respec costs, etc. I don't even object to this -- it is what it is.

In a town hall a long time ago, Russ explained that IGP never "bought in" to the CW concept -- but in reality, PGI itself has never embraced what CW could have become. And that is the bitter salt that keeps me at 97%-complete tier-4 failure in QP. ;-)

[S p a n i a r d]

It really looks silly because they called it "Skill Trees". We are ideally immersed in the Battletech Universe wherein
the main themes are politics, war, strategy, and a fusion of industrial/modern (looking) machinery called Battle/Omnimechs.

And there's suddenly twerks called "Skill Trees" which crashes the whole atmosphere making it look like Final Fantasy or one of those fantasy-based RPG games.

They should have called it Mech Enhancements or whatever, something like that.

And it would have been better if it was a simple point system instead of a skill tree graphical representation

Edited by S p a n i a r d, 27 July 2017 - 01:42 AM.

[Prof RJ Gumby]

S p a n i a r d, on 27 July 2017 - 01:33 AM, said:

...
They should have called it Mech Enhancements or whatever, something like that.
...

Or a tech tree. That would be simple as well.

Skill tree is not difficult to get or master. A bit tedious to unlock all your mechs back when you have like 3-digits of them. Still didn't 'master' all of minie, only those I felt like playing.

On the other hand, tried out to level up a rifleman from scratch, to see how it goes. It's actually pretty simple when you do it gradually, even when you don't know what you're doing ("oh so I have a point and I can have like 1% more range or 3,5% more accelleration or 1% less chance of getting critted...").

For me, leaving over the skill tree sounds more of an excuse than anything. I understood some people couldn't stand the rule of 3, but the skill tree? Nah.