704 replies to this topic

[byter75]

Regarding atm balance and smaller mechs;
With laser vomit and dakka you have a relatively simple equation, just point at the enemy and shoot. Now just because you fire a 40 dmg alpha strike doesn't always mean you deal 40, the smaller the mech, the harder it is to hit (particularly at range). This effectively balances for the tonnage you are shooting at quite well. If the mechs has around half the armour it will be around half the size and it will take about half the damage.
(Yes, there's a lot of nuances to this, the shape of the mech, what survival quirks it has, how skilled are both pilots, what range are we trading, gauss & pulse tend to ignore this more than their contempories. Though, the point is as a general rule, most of the time you'll take less damge as a light from these weapons if you play your cards right)

The tricky things with lockon missiles is that they follow a very different equation. IF you can get and hold a lock THEN deal full damage BUT ALSO reduce that damage by the amount of ams is available to counter you.
Locking onto a smaller mech does take longer but once those few additional moments of leeway are over the small mechs take just as much punishment as any big fat boi would.
There is ams, however ams' benefits are back to front, it is much easier to justify spending the tonnage on larger mechs and it rewards those larger mechs for grouping up. This means bigger mechs tend to be more resistant to missiles whist the lights who are trying to range ahead get little help from this tech option.
(Yes, you can stick close to your corsair 7A buddy, or be the ams kitfox but I don't think we should let these senarios cloud us from the issue that most lights want to use their speed for greater autonomy and that ams tends to not help with how lockons are shutting that down)

This is why streaks & even atms have a reputation for nuking smaller mechs, their effectiveness doesn't go down when shooting smaller targets and the ams counter tends to give the effective damage reduction to bigger mechs who stick together rather than small mechs who want to probe the enemy.

To address this I would suggest that lockons tend to spread and miss the target the smaller it is, that way they more closely follow the way other weapons tend to work against bigger and smaller tagets (which is the more fair way to do things imo).
ams is an interesting tech option but it has many problems (feast or famine, rewards blobbing up & thus nascar) and I don't see any good solutions coming any time soon. This patch and past patches seem content to just fiddle with both weapon systems willy nilly, when (at least in a QP enviroment) the disparate outcomes you can all to often get between too much missile or too much ams feels like sucess or failure is often down to a roll of the dice.

Edited by byter75, 05 April 2021 - 09:17 PM.

[dario03]

Albert C, on 05 April 2021 - 08:02 PM, said:

I generally agree with other changes, especially regarding lasers and mobility, but not with ATM.
ATMs are hard to use already, they have been receiving nerfs ever since introduction to the game especially after 2018. ATM seems to perform well only because this weapon needs much time and efforts to master and really, really discourages new players or inexperienced players and I could bet the percentage of highly skilled players playing ATM builds is much higher than other metas like LB10s. A highly situational weapon with high requirement on situation awareness and positioning, at least this is the way I play them. Considering their low flight arc and min range, that meams only a very few meta/strong meds(sometimes heavy) with good missile hpts, jump jets and decent mobility can utilze them to their maxinum potential(also needs a good pilot). You maybe still find few assaults with ATM builds in QP from time to time but they are incresingly rare due to the shorter optimal range and harsh min range penalty that cannot be compensated by basically non existence mobility.
The increase of missile health does NOT compensate for the dmg reduction. In close range the 2.5 dmg ATM cant compete with srm which has higher tonnage efficiency, less spread without deadzone; in med range it cant compete with mrm which penetrates ams like a boss and much cooler: in long range the 1.6 dmg does NOT make it a more viable alternative than the c-lrm in any way.
If you guys insist on nerfing the dmg to 2.5, PLEASE compensate it by increasing the optimal range to 300 meters and reduce its heat so that this weapon will be easier to use by inexperienced players and slightly better on assaults. And I think that fits your"increasing the viability and diversity of everything " goal.

The long range damage and more so the missile health increase are there to compensate for the damage decrease.

Like it says in the OP

Quote

As an example a 3xATM12 salvo in the current state of the game can deal either 108 damage (when AMS is not present), or 24 damage (when an enemy Corsair is in the area). After this patch, repeating the earlier example, the same 3xATM12 will be able to deal 90 damage when AMS is not present and they deal about 40 damage when an enemy Corsair is in the area).

So when no ams is around their damage is nerfed by ~17%. However when 4ams is around their damage has been buffed by ~67%.

Edited by dario03, 05 April 2021 - 09:05 PM.

[The6thMessenger]

Albert C, on 05 April 2021 - 08:02 PM, said:

I generally agree with other changes, especially regarding lasers and mobility, but not with ATM.
ATMs are hard to use already, they have been receiving nerfs ever since introduction to the game especially after 2018. ATM seems to perform well only because this weapon needs much time and efforts to master and really, really discourages new players or inexperienced players and I could bet the percentage of highly skilled players playing ATM builds is much higher than other metas like LB10s. A highly situational weapon with high requirement on situation awareness and positioning, at least this is the way I play them. Considering their low flight arc and min range, that meams only a very few meta/strong meds(sometimes heavy) with good missile hpts, jump jets and decent mobility can utilze them to their maxinum potential(also needs a good pilot). You maybe still find few assaults with ATM builds in QP from time to time but they are incresingly rare due to the shorter optimal range and harsh min range penalty that cannot be compensated by basically non existence mobility.
The increase of missile health does NOT compensate for the dmg reduction. In close range the 2.5 dmg ATM cant compete with srm which has higher tonnage efficiency, less spread without deadzone; in med range it cant compete with mrm which penetrates ams like a boss and much cooler: in long range the 1.6 dmg does NOT make it a more viable alternative than the c-lrm in any way.
If you guys insist on nerfing the dmg to 2.5, PLEASE compensate it by increasing the optimal range to 300 meters and reduce its heat so that this weapon will be easier to use by inexperienced players and slightly better on assaults. And I think that fits your"increasing the viability and diversity of everything " goal.

I actually agree somewhat, but the damage reduction is just warranted.The ATMs do unbelievable amount of damage within the sweetspot, and with 2.5 damage/missile it still do heavy damage if not unreasonable.

It's not that it loses on SRMs even with damage reduction, it's just that it has different uses. The Low-Arc isn't necessarily a detrimental factor, in fact that is what you want to have as it reduces the time-to-target. The Health-Increase isn't necessarily done to compensate for the damage reduction, in fact the ATMs do have this horrible performance with AMS in the first place.

I only agree with increase of sweetspot range to 270m. The increase of sweet spot range would make it a bit easier to pull off, and it's not like it has to be hard to pull off considering the reduced damage anymore.

Edited by The6thMessenger, 05 April 2021 - 09:10 PM.

[Krasnopesky]

Albert C, on 05 April 2021 - 08:02 PM, said:

I generally agree with other changes, especially regarding lasers and mobility, but not with ATM.
ATMs are hard to use already, they have been receiving nerfs ever since introduction to the game especially after 2018. ATM seems to perform well only because this weapon needs much time and efforts to master and really, really discourages new players or inexperienced players and I could bet the percentage of highly skilled players playing ATM builds is much higher than other metas like LB10s. A highly situational weapon with high requirement on situation awareness and positioning, at least this is the way I play them. Considering their low flight arc and min range, that meams only a very few meta/strong meds(sometimes heavy) with good missile hpts, jump jets and decent mobility can utilze them to their maxinum potential(also needs a good pilot). You maybe still find few assaults with ATM builds in QP from time to time but they are incresingly rare due to the shorter optimal range and harsh min range penalty that cannot be compensated by basically non existence mobility.
The increase of missile health does NOT compensate for the dmg reduction. In close range the 2.5 dmg ATM cant compete with srm which has higher tonnage efficiency, less spread without deadzone; in med range it cant compete with mrm which penetrates ams like a boss and much cooler: in long range the 1.6 dmg does NOT make it a more viable alternative than the c-lrm in any way.
If you guys insist on nerfing the dmg to 2.5, PLEASE compensate it by increasing the optimal range to 300 meters and reduce its heat so that this weapon will be easier to use by inexperienced players and slightly better on assaults. And I think that fits your"increasing the viability and diversity of everything " goal.

Thanks for the feedback. ATMs will definitely be something we will be looking at closely when the patch drops. We had many different ideas on ATMs, it would have been nice to have a PTS to test the different variations of balance on them.

The missile health buff makes them a lot more effective vs AMS. We ran simulations and tests to ensure this was so. Here is a portion of the results (we tested many more combinations, but I will just post this one here):

-----------------------
Currently:
3x ATM12: 108 / 72 / 43.2
3x ATM12 against 4x AMS (skilled): 28 missiles destroyed - 24 / 16 / 9.6 damage applied

After patch:
3x ATM12: 90 / 72 / 57.6
3x ATM12 against 4x AMS (skilled): 20 missiles destroyed - 40 / 32 / 25.6 damage applied

Close / medium / long range
-----------------------

Medium Mechs boating large amounts of ATMs are very common in both Quick Play and Faction Play (as you mention). They are extremely strong, being able to alpha over 100 damage. They are however countered heavily by AMS, to the point where you can either do huge amounts of damage or none at all depending on a piece of passive equipment. We aim to reduce the feast or famine element of this weapon system (note 'reduce' not eliminate).

MRMs currently get destroyed by AMS quite a bit (not as badly as current ATMs though):
2x MRM40 against 4x AMS (skilled): 51 missiles destroyed - 29 damage applied

Despite them both being missile based weapon systems I don't think comparing ATMs to SRMs works very well. They are quite different in their current implementation. Comparing ATMs to weapon systems like streaks and LRMs is better. I have covered the benefits of ATMs over LRMs in other posts on this thread, but the basics of it are clan LRMs take a lot longer to fire all their missiles and have a lot worse spread.

Edited by Krasnopesky, 05 April 2021 - 10:29 PM.

[dario03]

byter75, on 05 April 2021 - 09:00 PM, said:

Regarding atm balance and smaller mechs;
With laser vomit and dakka you have a relatively simple equation, just point at the enemy and shoot. Now just because you fire a 40 dmg alpha strike doesn't always mean you deal 40, the smaller the mech, the harder it is to hit (particularly at range). This effectively balances for the tonnage you are shooting at quite well. If the mechs has around half the armour it will be around half the size and it will take about half the damage.
(Yes, there's a lot of nuances to this, the shape of the mech, what survival quirks it has, how skilled are both pilots, what range are we trading, gauss & pulse tend to ignore this more than their contempories. Though, the point is as a general rule, most of the time you'll take less damge as a light from these weapons if you play your cards right)

The tricky things with lockon missiles is that they follow a very different equation. IF you can get and hold a lock THEN deal full damage BUT ALSO reduce that damage by the amount of ams is available to counter you.
Locking onto a smaller mech does take longer but once those few additional moments of leeway are over the small mechs take just as much punishment as any big fat boi would.
There is ams, however ams' benefits are back to front, it is much easier to justify spending the tonnage on larger mechs and it rewards those larger mechs for grouping up. This means bigger mechs tend to be more resistant to missiles whist the lights who are trying to range ahead get little help from this tech option.
(Yes, you can stick close to your corsair 7A buddy, or be the ams kitfox but I don't think we should let these senarios cloud us from the issue that most lights want to use their speed for greater autonomy and that ams tends to not help with how lockons are shutting that down)

This is why streaks & even atms have a reputation for nuking smaller mechs, their effectiveness doesn't go down when shooting smaller targets and the ams counter tends to give the effective damage reduction to bigger mechs who stick together rather than small mechs who want to probe the enemy.

To address this I would suggest that lockons tend to spread and miss the target the smaller it is, that way they more closely follow the way other weapons tend to work against bigger and smaller tagets (which is the more fair way to do things imo).
ams is an interesting tech option but it has many problems (feast or famine, rewards blobbing up & thus nascar) and I don't see any good solutions coming any time soon. This patch and past patches seem content to just fiddle with both weapon systems willy nilly, when (at least in a QP enviroment) the disparate outcomes you can all to often get between too much missile or too much ams feels like sucess or failure is often down to a roll of the dice.

I don't think this can be done with just xml changes.

[byter75]

dario03, on 05 April 2021 - 09:29 PM, said:

I don't think this can be done with just xml changes.

Sadly, yeah.
Still, in the long run I think it is worth persuing.
Since dumb fire is pretty fair against smaller mechs, all you need to do is add some code that reduces the spread according to what you are locked onto.

Properly fixing ams will also probably require more than just a simple xml change but I'd like its impact on the game be properly balanced in the long run. c:

[byter75]

Krasnopesky, on 05 April 2021 - 09:23 PM, said:

-----------------------
Currently:
3x ATM12: 108 / 72 / 43.2
3x ATM12 against 4x AMS (skilled): 28 missiles destroyed - 24 / 16 / 9.6 damage applied

After patch:
3x ATM12: 90 / 72 / 57.6
3x ATM12 against 4x AMS (skilled): 28 missiles destroyed - 40 / 32 / 25.6 damage applied

Close / medium / long range
-----------------------

Shouldn't the number of missiles destroyed be less after the patch which improves missile health?
*does some math* So, I think you mean to say that after patch it's 20 missiles destroyed (rather than 28).

Oh also, which skills and 4ams mech are we talking about?
The corsair has range quirks and can be skilled into range on top of the expected ams damage nodes from the survival tree.
This can produce much stronger results than the pirahna who hasn't got the range quirks (and might not be fully skilled into range).

Edited by byter75, 05 April 2021 - 10:10 PM.

[Krasnopesky]

byter75, on 05 April 2021 - 10:08 PM, said:

Shouldn't the number of missiles destroyed be less after the patch which improves missile health?
*does some math* So, I think you mean to say that after patch it's 20 missiles destroyed (rather than 28).

Oh also, which skills and 4ams mech are we talking about?
The corsair has range quirks and can be skilled into range on top of the expected ams damage nodes from the survival tree.
This can produce much stronger results than the pirahna who hasn't got the range quirks (and might not be fully skilled into range).

Thanks for pointing out that error. Simple copy-paste mistake which I just fixed.

The 4 AMS just counts the two AMS skill nodes that every Mech can take. It does not include any quirks like the Corsair's range quirk.

[Albert C]

Krasnopesky, on 05 April 2021 - 09:23 PM, said:

Thanks for the feedback. ATMs will definitely be something we will be looking at closely when the patch drops. We had many different ideas on ATMs, it would have been nice to have a PTS to test the different variations of balance on them.

The missile health buff makes them a lot more effective vs AMS. We ran simulations and tests to ensure this was so. Here is a portion of the results (we tested many more combinations, but I will just post this one here):

-----------------------
Currently:
3x ATM12: 108 / 72 / 43.2
3x ATM12 against 4x AMS (skilled): 28 missiles destroyed - 24 / 16 / 9.6 damage applied

After patch:
3x ATM12: 90 / 72 / 57.6
3x ATM12 against 4x AMS (skilled): 20 missiles destroyed - 40 / 32 / 25.6 damage applied

Close / medium / long range
-----------------------

Medium Mechs boating large amounts of ATMs are very common in both Quick Play and Faction Play (as you mention). They are extremely strong, being able to alpha over 100 damage. They are however countered heavily by AMS, to the point where you can either do huge amounts of damage or none at all depending on a piece of passive equipment. We aim to reduce the feast or famine element of this weapon system (note 'reduce' not eliminate).

MRMs currently get destroyed by AMS quite a bit (not as badly as current ATMs though):
2x MRM40 against 4x AMS (skilled): 51 missiles destroyed - 29 damage applied

Despite them both being missile based weapon systems I don't think comparing ATMs to SRMs works very well. They are quite different in their current implementation. Comparing ATMs to weapon systems like streaks and LRMs is better. I have covered the benefits of ATMs over LRMs in other posts on this thread, but the basics of it are clan LRMs take a lot longer to fire all their missiles and have a lot worse spread.

Maybe I was wrong but iirc ATM has a greater base spread than the cLRM. I don't think the shorter launch time makes it better in this case as the overall number of missiles is less and the flight arc really sucks. Even if they travell to their target without hitting obstacles(which is much more likely due to the low flight arc), then you gonna face the ams. 2LRM20(can boat easier) vs 2ATM12, u already know which one fares better. For a weapon system that weights 30% more and much hotter, does that dmg and health compensation make any real difference at that range? The overall ammo efficiency are reduced. If light mech survivalbility is the top concern here I think adding spread is better than reducing dmg which affects its performance against heavier mech. Like a cyclops for example, with 4lb10 it can deal 120 spread dmg within 5 seconds. Many players don't tend to boat atm12 too much instead using 3ATm9s or 2ATM12s, what about the impact on them?

[dario03]

Albert C, on 05 April 2021 - 10:56 PM, said:

Maybe I was wrong but iirc ATM has a greater base spread than the cLRM. I don't think the shorter launch time makes it better in this case as the overall number of missiles is less and the flight arc really sucks. Even if they travell to their target without hitting obstacles(which is much more likely due to the low flight arc), then you gonna face the ams. 2LRM20(can boat easier) vs 2ATM12, u already know which one fares better. For a weapon system that weights 30% more and much hotter, does that dmg and health compensation make any real difference at that range? The overall ammo efficiency are reduced. If light mech survivalbility is the top concern here I think adding spread is better than reducing dmg which affects its performance against heavier mech. Like a cyclops for example, with 4lb10 it can deal 120 spread dmg within 5 seconds. Many players don't tend to boat atm12 too much instead using 3ATm9s or 2ATM12s, what about the impact on them?

ATM has less spread than cLRM, especially with LOS. ATM9 has ~30% better spread than cLRM20.

[DAEDALOS513]

We keep hearing 'lack of resources' etc.. not sure how you think if you don't invest money back into the game, you will still get money from us.. you need money to make money.

[Krasnopesky]

Albert C, on 05 April 2021 - 10:56 PM, said:

Maybe I was wrong but iirc ATM has a greater base spread than the cLRM. I don't think the shorter launch time makes it better in this case as the overall number of missiles is less and the flight arc really sucks. Even if they travell to their target without hitting obstacles(which is much more likely due to the low flight arc), then you gonna face the ams. 2LRM20(can boat easier) vs 2ATM12, u already know which one fares better. For a weapon system that weights 30% more and much hotter, does that dmg and health compensation make any real difference at that range? The overall ammo efficiency are reduced. If light mech survivalbility is the top concern here I think adding spread is better than reducing dmg which affects its performance against heavier mech. Like a cyclops for example, with 4lb10 it can deal 120 spread dmg within 5 seconds. Many players don't tend to boat atm12 too much instead using 3ATm9s or 2ATM12s, what about the impact on them?

ATM9 and LRM20 are the best comparison as they have the same weight and slots. I have outlined the three main advantages ATMs have below (I am aware that LRMs have other advantages, but this is what distinguishes the two weapon systems):

Spread
Currently ATM9 has a direct fire spread of 3.5 whereas LRM20 has 5.05. This difference is quite large and can mean that you simply connect with more missiles against very small Mechs and do a lot more focused damage on larger Mechs (you can see when shooting a Heavy or Assault with ATMs the CT typically absorbs a lot of missiles).

Firing Duration
ATM9s shoot all their missiles in 0.4 seconds. LRM20s shoot all their missiles in 0.95 seconds. Again, this is a huge difference that has a large impact on how these weapon systems are used. Far quicker fire duration means that ATMs have to expose less to shoot and can thus peak and/or 'poptart' a lot more effectively. It also means that AMS has less time to shoot down the missiles, as the missiles are more tightly clustered compared to LRM20s large stream (of course this is also impacted by other factors like missile health and missile count). This lowered firing duration also results in ATM9s actually shooting slightly quicker than LRM20s as their overall recycle time is lower (5.4 seconds vs 5.55).

Damage
ATM9s still do more damage at shorter ranges than LRMs. A very typical loadout for Medium and Heavy Mechs is 3x ATM9 (Hunchback, Huntsman, Vapor Eagle, Hellfire, Mad Dog, Summoner can all do it comfortably, many of them even more):

3x ATM9: 67.5 damage at short range
3x LRM20: 60 damage at all ranges

These three elements combine to make ATMs a distinct weapon system with obvious advantages over their LRM counterparts.

ATM vs LBX
If you're going to compare ATMs to a Cyclops with 4x LBX10 at least compare it to another 90 tonne Mech (I don't think these weapon systems are great to compare due to how very different they are). Lets go with the Supernova that does typically run 4x ATM12.

4x ATM12 is 20 slots, 28 tonnes and can use Clan XL engines. 4x LBX10 is 24 slots, 44 tonnes and in the Cyclop's case is forced to use a standard engine.

4x ATM12 will do 120 damage at short range in one volley. In 5 seconds it can basically shoot twice (with cooldown nodes), so that is 240 damage in 5 seconds.

4x LBX10 will be 40 damage in one shot. In 5 seconds it can shoot three times so it does 120 damage in a bit under 5 seconds. If you expand the timeframe so the LBX10 can shoot four times then it does 160 damage.

So we are looking at 240 damage from only having to fire twice with a lockon weapon vs 160 damage from needing to shoot 4 times in the best case scenario. Noting that the LBX weapon system is more difficult to equip due to greater slots and weight.

If you want to compare only 2x ATM12s to LBX (which again I think is not a great comparison) then compare it to 2x LBX10 (2x ATM12 are often ran on medium Mechs and 2x LB10 are often ran on mediums too). The results are basically the same.

Of course the differences between these weapons are great and the ATMs have counters that LBX do not, but those are elements that balance the different weapon systems.

Edited by Krasnopesky, 06 April 2021 - 05:59 AM.

[Krasnopesky]

DAEDALOS513, on 06 April 2021 - 04:48 AM, said:

We keep hearing 'lack of resources' etc.. not sure how you think if you don't invest money back into the game, you will still get money from us.. you need money to make money.

I agree.

They are beginning this process at least. They have (obviously) hired the new Community Manager and more recently they have a Mech modeller working full time on the game and even more recently a map designer.

I think they desperately need a full time engineer, hopefully that will come in the future.

[DAEDALOS513]

Krasnopesky, on 06 April 2021 - 05:25 AM, said:

I agree.

They are beginning this process at least. They have (obviously) hired the new Community Manager and more recently they have a Mech modeller working full time on the game and even more recently a map designer.

I think they desperately need a full time engineer, hopefully that will come in the future.

As a veteran player I'm not so easily appeased.. if you count April that's 1/3 of a year wasted on minor hot fixes.

We couldn't get a pts to test Cauldron changes so they are being rammed down our throat.. we couldn't even get simple spawn point changes.. They should have done all this hiring long ago..

[Krasnopesky]

DAEDALOS513, on 06 April 2021 - 06:44 AM, said:

As a veteran player I'm not so easily appeased.. if you count April that's 1/3 of a year wasted on minor hot fixes.

We couldn't get a pts to test Cauldron changes so they are being rammed down our throat.. we couldn't even get simple spawn point changes.. They should have done all this hiring long ago..

I didn't say I was appeased. I just noted that at least some steps have been made as opposed to previous years of just straight decline and essentially ignoring the game.

As a fellow veteran player it makes little sense to me to bemoan past decisions on hiring and resource allocation. To what end does that achieve anything? Of course PGI could have allocated more money and resources to the game in the past, but they chose not to as a business (for better or worse). It honestly doesn't really have anything to do with us how the company decides to spend their money and time.

At this current point in time the PGI employees working on MWO are interacting with and taking feedback about the game from the entire community, not just The Cauldron. Giving them feedback as we have all been doing is productive in this sense. I suppose a constructive way to give feedback in this regard is the way you wrote your first message; 'PGI needs to spend some money to make money'.

[DAEDALOS513]

Krasnopesky, on 06 April 2021 - 07:01 AM, said:

I didn't say I was appeased. I just noted that at least some steps have been made as opposed to previous years of just straight decline and essentially ignoring the game.

As a fellow veteran player it makes little sense to me to bemoan past decisions on hiring and resource allocation. To what end does that achieve anything? Of course PGI could have allocated more money and resources to the game in the past, but they chose not to as a business (for better or worse). It honestly doesn't really have anything to do with us how the company decides to spend their money and time.

At this current point in time the PGI employees working on MWO are interacting with and taking feedback about the game from the entire community, not just The Cauldron. Giving them feedback as we have all been doing is productive in this sense. I suppose a constructive way to give feedback in this regard is the way you wrote your first message; 'PGI needs to spend some money to make money'.

Well you sound pretty appeased.. giving credit for the minor steps put forth in 4 months time.

"It has nothing to do with us (the customers) how the company decides to spend their money?" huh? Do you hear yourself?

I'm not bemoaning the past.. i'm bemoaning the last 4 months.. Dude, we gave them a ton of 'constructive feedback'.. GOOD feedback.. and it was mostly ignored. But Cauldron changes.. implemented without pts.. gimme a break.

Cauldron changes are a simple xml edit.. apparently.. hopefully there's more to the upcoming april patch than that ..

Edited by DAEDALOS513, 06 April 2021 - 08:35 AM.

[Krasnopesky]

DAEDALOS513, on 06 April 2021 - 08:25 AM, said:

Well you sound pretty appeased.. giving credit for the minor steps put forth in 4 months time.

"It has nothing to do with us (the customers) how the company decides to spend their money?" huh? Do you hear yourself?

I'm not bemoaning the past.. i'm bemoaning the last 4 months.. Dude, we gave them a ton of 'constructive feedback'.. GOOD feedback.. and it was mostly ignored. But Cauldron changes.. implemented without pts.. gimme a break.

Cauldron changes are a simple xml edit.. apparently.. hopefully there's more to the upcoming april patch than that ..

I only said they hired / brought in new people to work on the game. I'm just stating what has been done, not evaluating it. The map and Mech designers haven't produced anything yet, so I will wait to see what they produce. The timeframe has obviously been slow and a lot of people dislike that fact (including myself), but previously there wasn't even a timeframe.

From what I have heard they are listening and are aware of the feedback they have received, what feedback in particular do you feel was ignored? Ignoring feedback and either not being able to implement it or not having the time to do so yet are two different concepts.

As for the entire customer / company aspect you already identified the main interaction; you pay for a product/results as a customer. If the product isn't to your liking then you don't pay. How the company internally organises itself doesn't really matter in that regard.

I have basically agreed with you on your points so it feels strange to be having this debate. I also believe that PGI should devote more resources to improving the game, especially in regards to hiring an engineer so a lot of the suggestions that have been given actually have a chance to be implemented. To my knowledge outside of XML edits, map work and Mech modelling PGI cannot do a lot without an engineer to work on and implement suggestions related to the base code of the game / UI / tutorial etc.

Edited by Krasnopesky, 06 April 2021 - 08:53 AM.

[3RoyalStar1]

All I want is PGI to have Lots of gsp in the next bundles

[DAEDALOS513]

Krasnopesky, on 06 April 2021 - 08:52 AM, said:

I only said they hired / brought in new people to work on the game. I'm just stating what has been done, not evaluating it. The map and Mech designers haven't produced anything yet, so I will wait to see what they produce. The timeframe has obviously been slow and a lot of people dislike that fact (including myself), but previously there wasn't even a timeframe.

From what I have heard they are listening and are aware of the feedback they have received, what feedback in particular do you feel was ignored? Ignoring feedback and either not being able to implement it or not having the time to do so yet are two different concepts.

As for the entire customer / company aspect you already identified the main interaction; you pay for a product/results as a customer. If the product isn't to your liking then you don't pay. How the company internally organises itself doesn't really matter in that regard.

I have basically agreed with you on your points so it feels strange to be having this debate. I also believe that PGI should devote more resources to improving the game, especially in regards to hiring an engineer so a lot of the suggestions that have been given actually have a chance to be implemented. To my knowledge outside of XML edits, map work and Mech modelling PGI cannot do a lot without an engineer to work on and implement suggestions related to the base code of the game / UI / tutorial etc.

You are contradicting yourself.. first you say they are taking feedback and then you say if i don't like the game i'm free to leave. Call me whacky but If I don't like the way a game is handled then I will state it. Games don't become successful with your business model of take it or leave it lol.

If you want to read all our suggestions be my guest and check the forums.. but there were lots of low hanging fruit suggestions that were ignored... yes IGNORED. No other excuse because many were easy to implement.

I know what has been done so far, you don't have to repeat for them. I don't care.. I look at results and all I'm saying is 4 months in (not having high hopes for april patch) and we're still waiting for something that gives added value to the game.. even easy QOL changes.. not just fixes for broken things or weapon tweaks.

I'm not sure why we are debating either..

Edited by DAEDALOS513, 06 April 2021 - 09:15 AM.

[John Bronco]

You don't think balance adds value to a game?