478 replies to this topic

[Diablobo]

Same mass does not equal same volume. Design also plays a big part in size, as does the size of the engines and armor and weapon configurations. The Catapult and Timber Wolf are good examples of this. Those big missile boxes make the mech bigger than what their tonnage would suggest.

[Khobai]

Purusee, on 04 March 2018 - 02:13 AM, said:

Scratch the Mini-Atlas, I want an Assault-Commando!

they should release a new set of heroes for solaris

mini-atlas
assault-commando
earless-catapult
actuallythesizeofamedium-shadowhawk
anorexic-awesome
actuallyhashitboxesthatcanbehit-assassin
superheavy-locust
midget-annihilator



take my money PGI

Edited by Khobai, 04 March 2018 - 02:38 PM.

[PocketYoda]

Man what i'd give for an Atlas the size of a Commando.

[The Amazing Atomic Spaniel]

They scaled only within each weight class. I guess that if they had made the lights the same density as assaults then they would be too easy to hit. MWO's gameplay only let's lights do well if they are so small they can dodge a lot of incoming fire

[Der Geisterbaer]

Nightbird, on 03 March 2018 - 08:15 PM, said:

This post is just a demonstration of volumetric scaling assuming uniform density.

Well that assumption certainly makes ...

Nightbird, on 03 March 2018 - 08:15 PM, said:

It's math, not opinion.

... the seemingly "unopinionated" math easier but not necessarily more correct. As a certain astrophysicist put it: Math can be used to prove anything. With enough cleverness you can show any physical constant in a dutch ladies' bike

Nightbird, on 03 March 2018 - 08:15 PM, said:

For the comparison, I'm using the 100 Ton atlas and 25 Ton Commando because they're proportionally very close.

Well, if they actually were that close in proportion their frontal cross-section should not deviate that much once you make a proportional size ajustment (a.k.a. linear upscale) of the Commando to match height of the Atlas. Now look at the quick comparison I threw together based on your screenshot by first islolating the Atlas on the left and the Commando on the right, proportionally resizing the latter to the former's height and then making a full overlay of their respective cross-sections:



Those differences do certainly more than account for the difference you seemingly found with your attempt of making a volumetric comparison. But truth be told your actual error in that comparison of yours is something else entirely ...

Nightbird, on 03 March 2018 - 08:15 PM, said:

Volumetric scaling between the two mechs means that the Commando should have 1/4th the volume of the Atlas.

Correct ... emphasis on "volume", which refers to depth, width and height at the same time but not necessarily with equal factors on all three axis ... and that's were things get ugly - an partially dishonest - in your comparison.

Nightbird, on 03 March 2018 - 08:15 PM, said:

What does 1/4 the volume look like? Let's start with a simpler shape, a cube, and compare two cubes, one 1/4 the volume of the other.

https://i.imgur.com/XOWMlT8.png


Basically, if you take any object and shrink the length, width, and height to 63% of the original, you get 1/4 of the volume of the original. This also applies to mechs. If this is hard to imagine, just think of a mech as being made of a lot of cubes. If the dimensions of all of those cubes are shrunk to 63%, the resulting mech is 1/4 the volume.

So instead of a cuboid - that would be more fitting due to the general measurements of both the Atlas and the Commando and still not represent the actual volume parameters for either one - you're using a cube to get to a 0.63 factor on all three axes that you then apply in a linear fasion to the Atlas' height.

Let's say I wanted a mech that has 1/4th of the original volume but only 1/5th of the original height, what are the factors for depth and width on that? ...

Nightbird, on 03 March 2018 - 08:15 PM, said:

Now, let's start with PGI's Atlas, and shrunk the dimension down to 63%, getting a 25 Ton Atlas. How does it's size compare to the Commando?

https://i.imgur.com/NeZifld.jpg

... because this mathematically might work for you in terms of this "PSA", but it's not correct in terms of actual volumetric scaling that you try to explain. Which in turn makes ...

Nightbird, on 03 March 2018 - 08:15 PM, said:

And there you go... the scaling between mechs are too exaggerated, either the lights are too small or assaults are too large.

... your conclusion wrong due to an incorrect proposition with regards to the compared mechs' proportions and an incorrect application of volumetric factors

[Scyther]

While I like the math, and the scaled images, and I reluctantly agree that a set of mini-assaults for Solaris would probably sell like hotcakes...

Tonnage does not equal density does not equal volume. True volumetric scaling would rely on having a set of dimension specs (length width depth etc) for each body part.

I have no idea what PGI based their scale calculations on, other than 'we think this looks about right'. Regardless, we have what we have and I suspect it will never change.

[ocular tb]

I think some standardization is good for a baseline but I also think it'd be better to just fudge the scaling a bit for problematic mechs instead of trying to fix them with lots of quirks that often times just miss the mark. If a mech such as the Awesome is always going to have problems because of it's wide frontal profile, give it some liberties and let it be smaller than what its "supposed" to be.

[Iron Heel]

In real world application, as someone whos actually stood between a 13 ton M577 APC and a 70 ton M1 Battle Tank, I can say with all certainty that MWO's volumetric scaling is a bit off.

there are far too many more variables involved to rely on just volume..

I don't wanna blow up OPs premise, because his work is good, but you have to also take into account variable density of your base cubes.

Edited by Iron Heel, 04 March 2018 - 07:00 AM.

[HGAK47]

I hate the idea of light mechs getting any larger but I am all for assaults being smaller.

[Koniving]

WrathOfDeadguy, on 03 March 2018 - 11:24 PM, said:

Scale down larger 'Mechs rather than scaling up smaller ones. It'll increase TTK on the bigs, which is good, without screwing over lights, which would be bad.

It would also be very nice if, along with a second (hopefully better executed) rescale pass, PGI would also give every 'Mech the ability to step over obstacles which only come up to their shins, rather than stumbling over them like a drunkard with an inner ear infection. Unrelated issue, I know, but a guy can hope, right?

You mean this is a problem!?

Huh. Wouldn't have known.

(Sarcasm btw, stub my toes on stuff a lot in MWO)

[Shadowomega1]

Someone else did something similar to this and figured the MWO Atlas is 18 or 19 meters tall, while over at Catalyst games it is around 14 or 16 meters tall. So some mechs are a bit taller then their suppose to be.

[RaptorRage]

There is also the issue that some Mechs can't even fit the cockpits and pilots in the model of the Mech head if you check the free view external camera in Training Grounds and switch from 1PV to 3PV. So either those Mechs are too small or the pilots and cockpits are too large in those cases.

[InspectorG]

Shoulda used Surface Are instead of Volume....
Oh well, too late now.

[Nightbird]

Der Geisterbaer, on 04 March 2018 - 04:27 AM, said:

Bleh

Here is a 200 Ton Commando. From eyeballing, the waist and shoulders are still smaller than the Atlas despite the slightly higher height, so I would still say the volume is still slightly less than today's Atlas.

Do you really think any of those items you listed makes that big of a difference? Did they switch out armor for foam padding to make it look bigger?

Edited by Nightbird, 04 March 2018 - 11:10 AM.

[FLG 01]

This is the only canonic size chart:


It's from the TRO:3039.

[Y E O N N E]

InspectorG, on 04 March 2018 - 08:48 AM, said:

Shoulda used Surface Are instead of Volume....
Oh well, too late now.

In either case, greeble and effectively useless dead-space should be discounted. And they weren't, e.g. Blackjack has these big pockets to either side of the cockpit that have zero tactical impact (good or bad), but because they are open space the Blackjack got slightly larger.

Edited by Yeonne Greene, 04 March 2018 - 10:27 AM.

[Nightbird]

Tarl Cabot, on 04 March 2018 - 12:22 AM, said:

Are you able to do that and include.. Enforcer/Trebuchet?!?! Nevermind, the Enforcer/Trebuchet 50ton mechs comes up to approx where the smaller Altas sits on the last screen shot

The issue with lights is that there is an an absolute minimum size in MWO, of which primarily the locust may be right at or under the cusp of it.

And even if the OP is off by a tad, the Atlas when scaled up from the Commando it still likely be no where near its current live size.

Ask and you shall receive (I did both directions in one image though, so don't compare the middle two)

[Wildstreak]

FLG 01, on 04 March 2018 - 10:14 AM, said:

This is the only canonic size chart:


It's from the TRO:3039.

According to that chart, a Grasshopper is shorter than a Banshee yet in game, they are near the same height.

It will never be right.

Edited by Wildstreak, 04 March 2018 - 11:11 AM.

[jper4]

JackalBeast, on 03 March 2018 - 08:18 PM, said:

That's actually pretty cool.

Annnnd now I want a mini-Atlas.

so the mini-atlas is the teenaged commando then right?

[Nightbird]

For fun: 100 Ton Locust and 100 Ton Cheeta... your worst nightmares realized