55 replies to this topic

[MechaBattler]

People are always calling for nerfs and buffs. Doesn't mean something will happen about it. They're not always warranted.

But if one mech or weapon is performing heads and shoulders than all others of it's kind. It's simpler to bring the outlier into line than it is to buff everything else to a ridiculous standard.

Edited by MechaBattler, 03 September 2017 - 02:24 PM.

[CraneArmy]

***SPOILERS BELOW***

buffing something is the same as nerfing everything else

***SPOILERS ABOVE***

[kesmai]

Yes buffs!
Buff the heat across the board!




Kek

[MagicIndex]

El Bandito, on 03 September 2017 - 09:24 AM, said:

Linebacker is still good. Far from dead.

Linebacker have armor quirks which he should not have at all due his low and compact profile. LBK is top condidate to upcomming nerfs as MG's.

[metallio]

I'd be up for an across the board armor buff. Triple the armor value. That'd be fine.

[Tordin]

Buff cSPL dmg to 5 or 6.
Buff standard MG dmg to 1.4 ( which the HMG have currently) and buff the Heavy machine gun dmg to 2.8. Then the HMG which have abysmal range, can get some serious dmg done since it have the lowest critting potentiale of the three mg types..

LMG 0.7 dmg/ s ---
MG 1.0 dmg / s -> 1.4 dmg/ s
HMG 1.4 -> 2.8 dmg/s

There will be wrecking time. The LMG are alredy doing their jobfairly well so they could stay untouched.

Edited by Tordin, 04 September 2017 - 08:17 AM.

[MadRover]

Requiemking, on 03 September 2017 - 10:06 AM, said:

It has high energy mounts and not a lot of mech between them and the cockpit. It would still be perfectly fine as a poke mech.

Its not a poke mech though. Its a get in, get out splat of doom mech.

[Requiemking]

MadRover, on 04 September 2017 - 11:34 AM, said:

Its not a poke mech though. Its a get in, get out splat of doom mech.

No, I see plenty of dual ERPPC Pokebackers kicking about. If it got it's agility nerfed, it would be fine.

[ocular tb]

With the amount of power-creep we've had the last few years I'd rather nerf the over-performers than buff the under-performers. There are of course going to be some exceptions.

[Koniving]

DrSaphron, on 03 September 2017 - 09:01 AM, said:

I've been seeing waaay too many calls for nerfs to basically everything lately when what we need are buffs! Most notably the return of engine sync! Now Im not looking for full on old engine sync stats but more like 50% of what it used to be. Mobility should increase TTK as well as un-killing certain chassis such as the Phoenix Hawk and Linebacker.

Discuss?

Side note:
A fuckload of mechs with low engine limits got a shitton better after the desync... and the ones most hurt by it were those with insanely big engines.

Unless there's some sort of in betweener I haven't heard about yet... desync was pretty win for the low engine cap guys.

[Y E O N N E]

ocular tb, on 04 September 2017 - 04:53 PM, said:

With the amount of power-creep we've had the last few years I'd rather nerf the over-performers than buff the under-performers. There are of course going to be some exceptions.

But the overperformers are, by and large, over-performers because of basic configuration that can't be changed without breaking the lore builds, which PGI won't do. You have to blanket nerf equipment to reign them in, but that means everything else still needs to get buffed to compensate.

[Angel of Annihilation]

DrSaphron, on 03 September 2017 - 09:01 AM, said:

I've been seeing waaay too many calls for nerfs to basically everything lately when what we need are buffs! Most notably the return of engine sync! Now Im not looking for full on old engine sync stats but more like 50% of what it used to be. Mobility should increase TTK as well as un-killing certain chassis such as the Phoenix Hawk and Linebacker.

Discuss?

While I absolutely agree with your statement about Buffs, not Nerfs, I am not sure the mobility system needs an overhaul and in fact I actually think it was a great idea on PGI's part to add another dial they could turn to tune balance more closely. However I will absolutely agree that some mechs need their mobility tuned upward a bit. 100 tonners for example and yes I am talking ALL 100 tonners need to see their base acceleration moved up to around 10. As it stands now they have around half the acceleration of a 90-95 ton mech which is just crazy. There are a few others than could stand a bit of mobility buffing as well.

As to the entire concept of Buffs instead of Nerfs, well I am still waiting for one set of patch notes were I can read them and be like "Hell yeah my mechs got buffed!" rather than "Aww frack, they screwed my mechs over yet again." I am also waiting on the first set of patch notes where nothing Clan didn't gets slamed to the ground with the nerf bat. There is just way too much negative in every set of patch notes.

Andi Nagasia, on 03 September 2017 - 02:07 PM, said:

weak things should be buffed, and strong things should be nerfed.

See this is wrong. Weak things should be buffed, strong things should remain strong. Overpowered things should be nerfed. There is a big difference here. There are tons an tons of good, strong mechs in the game and none of them deserve to be nerfed. Strong and Overpowered are two different things so if you say strong things should be nerfed, then you basically subscribing to the idea that the only way for the game to be balanced is for all mechs to be equally garbage and that tends to be the direction PGI goes with balancing. Any mech that performs well gets nerfed until it doesn't and that is just sad.

[Felicitatem Parco]

Buffing weapons nerfs armor.

Buffing armor nerfs weapons.

Buffing engines nerfs projectile weapons.

Buffing FLD projectile weapons nerfs TTK.

Buffing sensor range nerfs brawlers.

Buffing Brawling weapons nerfs TTK.

Buffing LRMs nerfs the NPE.



What do you want to buff without Nerfing anything?

[General Solo]

Most losses I see are due to lack of teamwork rather than balance.
TeamworkOP

Edited by OZHomerOZ, 04 September 2017 - 05:55 PM.

[Champion of Khorne Lord of Blood]

Requiemking, on 04 September 2017 - 04:33 PM, said:

No, I see plenty of dual ERPPC Pokebackers kicking about. If it got it's agility nerfed, it would be fine.

Issue is that a lot of the time a mech gets nerfed because its good at one build in particular, but that nerf brings not only the top build down, but all builds.

For example, hunchback IICs got their agility and twisting nerfed, but their main role was poptarting with ERPPCs. The agility and twisting nerf had absolutely no effect on the meta poptart build but hit the non meta brawling builds incredibly hard, the CSPL build is pretty much gone from the combination of that mobility nerf and the CSPL nerf. In the end only the ERPPC poptart build and the super laser alpha poke build remain viable and they were already the top contenders in the first place.

In many cases PGI's nerfs to mobility have been exactly this. They just make the mech in question very annoying to drive but generally don't hurt the performance of the top builds that bad but end up killing potential brawling builds and other non meta builds.


So yeah, Linebacker would still perform great with an agility nerf as a poke mech, but as a brawling build or anything else that isn't following the meta it goes right into the trash bin.

Prosperity Park, on 04 September 2017 - 05:44 PM, said:

Buffing weapons nerfs armor.

Buffing armor nerfs weapons.

Buffing engines nerfs projectile weapons.

Buffing FLD projectile weapons nerfs TTK.

Buffing sensor range nerfs brawlers.

Buffing Brawling weapons nerfs TTK.

Buffing LRMs nerfs the NPE.



What do you want to buff without Nerfing anything?

The whole point is psychology. Players get mad and quit in the face of repeated direct nerfs to what they are using. However, players don't get mad at indirect nerfs to what they are using in the form of buffs to other things, infact it usually just results in players spending more money or cbills to try out the thing that got buffed. This is how games that have powercreep are so incredibly healthy with large playerbases, people actually want to grind up to get that new thing instead of feeling bad about that thing they grinded up to getting direct nerfs.

Koniving, on 04 September 2017 - 05:08 PM, said:

Side note:
A fuckload of mechs with low engine limits got a shitton better after the desync... and the ones most hurt by it were those with insanely big engines.

Unless there's some sort of in betweener I haven't heard about yet... desync was pretty win for the low engine cap guys.

It seems more like the mechs that had low engine caps didn't get anything at all, everything else just got undeserved nerfs. Take for example the Dire Wolf, along with all other 100 ton mechs they have the lowest mobility in the game. No amount of adding additional engine weight helps them anymore. So it turns out that mechs that paid large amounts of tonnage for those engines that get higher and higher in weight as they go up in rating don't get any bonus over the mechs that didn't pay that weight except for ground speed increase and potentially more heatsink slots in the engine.

This greatly hurts mechs that are stuck with high engines and low mobility that can't swap down to a lower engine, the Timber Wolf, for example, has a huge engine but its one of the least mobile heavies other than the Night Gyr. I've dropped the engine ratings in many of my mechs from the 80+kph of before down to just hitting 70kph on my heavies because without the twist speed, accel, and decel boosts its just not worth the weight.


The only things that really got a buff in this case were those guys who put on super tiny sub 48kph engines and way too many guns to handle with their heat ratings.

Edited by Dakota1000, 04 September 2017 - 06:24 PM.

[MadRover]

Viktor Drake, on 04 September 2017 - 05:35 PM, said:

Weak things should be buffed, strong things should remain strong. Overpowered things should be nerfed. There is a big difference here. There are tons an tons of good, strong mechs in the game and none of them deserve to be nerfed. Strong and Overpowered are two different things so if you say strong things should be nerfed, then you basically subscribing to the idea that the only way for the game to be balanced is for all mechs to be equally garbage and that tends to be the direction PGI goes with balancing. Any mech that performs well gets nerfed until it doesn't and that is just sad.

This is true balancing right here. If the nerf bat would stop being swung then PGI might actually have a game that will get more people interesting. Instead, the bent the knee and went bonkers with nerfs that quite honestly drove a lot of people away. Well said.

[SPNKRGrenth]

We need universal nerfs across the board to actually increase TTK in a reasonable fashion. Make ALL cooldowns 10% longer. Done.

No to any engine sync.

Making the turbo slow mechs have a bit of actual maneuverability though, yes. Also make the agility tree points based for most of the stats instead of percent based, then balance the numbers based on what weight class something is. IE light medium heavy assault.

Buff things that are bad so they're better, but leave good things good outside of small tuning nerfs to tweak something.

So nerf everything to shoot a little slower, and make the agility tree useful for ALL mechs instead of just some of them. And buff the agility of some mechs that are just terribly sluggish, to instead be somewhat sluggish.

[SOL Ranger]

In a sense for quick results I agree it can be necessary or desirable sometimes even though I don't agree principally. Simply increasing defensive values is an easy and quick way of adding higher TTK and some other desirable effects, by simply buffing armour and I believe it should be done until the values can be refined better later.

We do need serious maximum armour buffs so that people can themselves elect whether to go more defensive or offensive and pay for or sacrifice the lacking armour for it, the values involved need to be meaningful and large enough to allow compromises to be made by weight to a higher degree, and these are benefits to be had by mechs with poor layouts that could use heavier armoured builds to redeem them somewhat as well.

Something like:

• CT/RT/LT frontal armour and rear armour maximum values introduced as limitations rather than total maximum armour, and both are set at 25% increased value over what the current maximum armour for the component is.
  
• CT 100% maximum total armour increased(relax, read on, it amounts to only 25% frontal armour). This to dissuade people from CT tunneling and blunt the blow of focus fire on the CT alone. There should be more value in quickly shooting off weapon carrying limbs first. Seems like a hefty number, it isn't considering the following mechanic introduced.
  
• RT/LT 50% maximum total armour increased(same as CT with only 25% of that possible as frontal improvement), clearly weaker than the CT as intended.
  
• All other components 15% maximum armour increased. Increasing only slightly while remaining vulnerable and requiring further compromise of weight to utilise it.
  
• Add a limit on maximum armour on both front and back where maximum total armour on a component must be well beyond either of those restrictions, such that having rear armour is actually an option for weight rather than something completely suboptimal due to the cost of losing frontal armour. There is compromise and you can't use all total armour for frontal armour, and you can evaluate the need for rear armour independently.

i.e. Lets say we have CT total armour maximum at 100 currently and with the increase we end up at 200 total. Then we add the proposed maximum side wise allocation that can be possible

CT Front armour maximum = 125, a 25% increase on maximum frontal armour.
CT Rear armour maximum = 125, a 25% increase on maximum rear armour.

What would right now be something like CT 97 frontal and 3 armour in the rear, would become 125 frontal and up to 75 in the rear, but costing several tons more to the build to carry it as none of it is free.

125 armour in front for most normal builds, while still being able to allocate up to a whopping 75 in the rear without becoming suboptimal for frontal assaults as such defensively, although paying heavily in weight for it of course and the evaluation for how much rear armour you want is a real one. Also one is still able to go below in any and all values if so deemed desirable to play glass cannon.

This also allows people with difficulties fighting against rear facing fast enemies to sacrifice weight for rear armour to survive for longer, acknowledging and building against their weaknesses as should be part of the game.

Without this kind of mechanic everyone would simply run more or less full frontal armour as they do now. This is a pragmatic solution to a problem of min/maxing and estimations of very low likelihood of needing larger amounts of armour on the back over the front.

We can't have those armour values compete with each other because then the rear armour always loses out even if you get totally bum rushed by lights once in 50 games there is no reason to sacrifice frontal armour in those 49 other games, however losing a ton ammo or a heatsink might well be worth adding some significant rear armour improvement; Armour costs in terms of weight anyway so there is meaningful compromise already without the front/back compromise being so dominant.


Reserved for all the human things.

[Y E O N N E]

SPNKRGrenth, on 04 September 2017 - 07:15 PM, said:

We need universal nerfs across the board to actually increase TTK in a reasonable fashion. Make ALL cooldowns 10% longer. Done.

RIP all ACs.

[sceii]

Come on, ttk is higher then ever before (ok may be it's higher then 3025 beta or pre clan invasion, but this things were more then 3 years ago).
Weapons are getting worse(IS ML got buffed, OK) with every patch iteration while armor get buffed.(and mobility was nerfed a shitton of times too)

SPNKRGrenth, on 04 September 2017 - 07:15 PM, said:

We need universal nerfs across the board to actually increase TTK in a reasonable fashion. Make ALL cooldowns 10% longer. Done.
So nerf everything to shoot a little slower, and make the agility tree useful for ALL mechs instead of just some of them. And buff the agility of some mechs that are just terribly sluggish, to instead be somewhat sluggish.

Try to pilot clan mech with only heavy lasers and tell me how FUN this expirience was.
Weapon CD were already nerfed hard since ST, we lost most of 10%+ cd quirks and lost 17% weapon module+skill CD.(now we have 9.6% cd in ST)
NO AMOUNT OF ARMOR BUFFING WILL SAVE YOUR *** FROM CONCENTRATED FIRE OF GROUP OF MECHS.

Edited by sceii, 05 September 2017 - 12:38 AM.