86 replies to this topic

[Gagis]

micro hopping was fixed years ago.

[1453 R]

FupDup, on 29 May 2021 - 07:55 AM, said:

Just wanna point out here that sub-250 engines are no longer punished in terms of heat. PoorDubs are long gone, now internal and external DHS are equal and have been for a few years.

But the space penalty still applies, unfortunately.

Ahhhh, good to know! That always sucked far harder than it needed to for 'Mechs that couldn't or didn't want to run all the way up to 250 or above. Good work, Whoever-Fixed-That-Dumb-Idea.

I'll also admit, for the sake of full disclosure and admitting my mistakes, that I totally forgot the Linebacker had four fixed engine heat sinks that should be counted as payload space since there's basically zero Linebacker builds that don't want those heat sinks. So 21 tons to the CN9-D's 17, assuming LFE and Light Ferro on the CN9-D. The CN9-D still wins out on payload space with an XL, but the way I hear it Sphere XLs basically stopped existing for everything but lights the instant LFEs were introduced, so mleghm.

But yes. I've never felt particularly disadvantaged in my mediums when I go mediuming. Medium and smaller/quicker heavies are my preferred machines, and even when they're no faster than enemy heavies in a drag race? They turn faster, they accelerate/decelerate/change directions and vectors faster, and the Clan machines I tend to pilot most to exclusively don't really suffer that much of a deficit on firepower, either. Hell, an armor-trimmed Huntsman has 24 tons of payload even with its five fixed jumpy-jets. A full-up Timber Wolf, at the same 81 klicks and without the jump jets, has 27.5 tons - only three and a half more. The TBR-S, with the same five jumpy-jets as a Huntsman? 22.5 tons - a ton and a half less payload than the Huntsman, while moving the same speed with inferior Fat 'Mech Jump Jets and drastically lower agility even after the mobility buffs.

Mediums are better at ducking in and out of cover and changing vector and velocities quickly to take advantage of terrain. Even when they have equal or even lower groundspeed than heavies. That 70kph Hunchback carrying heavy 'Mech firepower in a smaller, nimbler package? It makes a great escort and screening unit for the high-value Fatness Monsters on the field, because like I said earlier - every weight class is most vulnerable to the one right above it. Including lights being most afraid of mediums, not heavies or assaults.

So yeah. Some mediums doubtless need help, but Mediums-The-Class are fine.

[Bulletsponge0]

Major Malfunktion, on 27 May 2021 - 04:35 AM, said:

If you waited for a balanced 3-3-3-3 on each side, waiting times for matches would probably be longer... particularly for people piloting heavies and assaults.

That said, the matchmaker is broken beyond belief - only yesterday had a game with 6A 4H 1M 1L on one side, 3A 2H 2M 5L on the other. Total drop weights were 875 - 665. Until they sort that sort of shambles out, you have no chance of getting balanced matches.

What side won though? I've seen the heavy team win in that scenario and I've seen the light team win in that scenario.

Gagis, on 29 May 2021 - 11:12 AM, said:

micro hopping was fixed years ago.

No it wasn't. They claimed they fixed the animation while jumping on a few mechs, but there still is a problem of mechs feathering Jjs that causes hit reg problems

[Vercors]

Major Malfunktion, on 27 May 2021 - 04:35 AM, said:

If you waited for a balanced 3-3-3-3 on each side, waiting times for matches would probably be longer... particularly for people piloting heavies and assaults.

That said, the matchmaker is broken beyond belief - only yesterday had a game with 6A 4H 1M 1L on one side, 3A 2H 2M 5L on the other. Total drop weights were 875 - 665. Until they sort that sort of shambles out, you have no chance of getting balanced matches.

I have made a proposition here to try to solve this problem. So yes, sometime you will not play in the tonnage category you want, but i think it's a good compromise.

[Khobai]

justcallme A S H, on 29 May 2021 - 12:04 AM, said:

You are basically always. You just can't admit it.

As if Meds are struggling... VGL, HMN, HBKIIC, WVR, VL, BSW, ASN, PHX

All of them are very strong, most of them used at the highest levels of comp play as well... But you know, "struggling"...

I like how you only point out the best mediums while ignoring all the ones that are struggling.

If you look at the totality of all the mechs in the weight class, and not just the best ones, I think it paints an entirely different picture. Which is why youre wrong.

Yes there are outliers in every weight class. That is true. But the outliers arnt representative of the entire weight class. Thats why theyre outliers. Every mech you listed is an exception not the rule. If only all mediums were as good as those.

Youre just ignorantly content with ignoring any mech that isnt competitively viable and pretend like they dont exist. When in reality there are far more bad mediums than good ones lmao. But of course you arnt listing them.

Edited by Khobai, 30 May 2021 - 06:27 AM.

[John Bronco]

Khobai, on 30 May 2021 - 06:18 AM, said:

I like how you only point out the best mediums while ignoring all the ones that are struggling.

You could say that about every class in the game, as there are far more bad mechs than good ones.

Hence the full rebalance that is in flight right now.

[East Indy]

Happy to see this drove some discussion!

I had to jump off quickly the night I posted this and I see how it came across as a hot take to buff lights. While Khobai and I are fellow travelers for variety and I think the Cauldron needs to prove itself of quirks, my point was actually the *opposite*. Lighter 'Mechs *don't* need across-the-board buffs if teams weren't as hopelessly overweight as they are now. It's a pretty tight spiral that we're in and there's far more that could be done than shrugging shoulders and putting up with PGI's inadequate design. *Especially* now.

Vercors, on 29 May 2021 - 09:01 PM, said:

I have made a proposition here to try to solve this problem. So yes, sometime you will not play in the tonnage category you want, but i think it's a good compromise.

This is interesting! The no-brainer is weight class assignments for groups. Few excuses at this point for not scheduling it for design and execution in 2021. My other suggestion is a call-to-arms incentive for lighter 'Mechs. Lights and mediums flood QP when there's an event or freebie; why restrict that to events? I get that MechWarrior/BattleTech is kind of a meathead '80s metal franchise group but its design approach doesn't need to be as obtuse.

Edited by East Indy, 30 May 2021 - 07:43 AM.

[1453 R]

I mean, one easy way to improve the light and medium 'Mech Joch Experience right off the bat is to eliminate Domination as a game mode. Domination is probably as close as you'll ever really come to Space Diabetes and may be a contender for the worst-designed game mode in any game in the history of gaming - specifically because it absolutely and utterly prevents any form of maneuvering by either team. You gitch'er giant metal-plated posterior in the pee stain, you keep yer giant metal-plated posterior in the pee stain, you fight on that hill and you die on that hill - whether you're built as a Stand And Deliver close-range slugfest brawler or not. It's absolutely terrible and any pilot that favors mobility over Fatness hates it.

Which probably explains why it's by far the most popular/voted game mode - every single goddamned Fatbro pilot out there picks it so they can ignore light or medium 'Mechs and do their best to grind their fatness against the other team's fatness in the most bizarre, nonsensical and slightly-offputting display of Giant Metal Slightly Sexual Space Sumo the world has ever seen, except without any of the skill, talent, athleticism or sportsmanship of actual sumo.

Holy **** I hate Domination so much...

[Leone]

What? Nonsense. Only one mech needs stay in the center. Heck, I've hadta tromp a Daishi and park it in there once because the rest of my team didn't bother with it and just circled the outside picking off the enemy. Lights are very well served by everyone pointing their attention towards the center and thusly, away from the edges in which they circle.

~Leone.

Edited by Leone, 30 May 2021 - 04:25 PM.

[Doriam]

My Pir-2 with 15 HSL saying "Hi" to any mech. Look behind more often

Edited by Doriam, 30 May 2021 - 04:16 PM.

[PocketYoda]

Happens a lot in the lower tiers, because mediums and lights are either garbage or too hard to use for newer players and neither generate the big dollars at the end of a match in unskilled hands..

So everyone runs Heavies and Assaults because they are more forgiving and the matchmaker is broken.

Leone, on 30 May 2021 - 04:01 PM, said:

What? Nonsense. Only one mech needs stay in the center. Heck, I've hadta tromp a Daishi and park it in there once because the rest of my team didn't bother with it and just circled the outside picking off the enemy. Lights are very well served by everyone pointing their attention towards the center and thusly, away from the edges in which they circle.

~Leone.

If one mech is only in the center then the enemy team focuses and kills it for an easy win on the timer.. Team play is king..

Edited by MechaGnome, 30 May 2021 - 05:58 PM.

[Khobai]

John Bronco, on 30 May 2021 - 07:21 AM, said:

You could say that about every class in the game, as there are far more bad mechs than good ones.

Hence the full rebalance that is in flight right now.

yes but the bad mediums are far worse off than the bad heavies or bad assaults in most cases.

[Escef]

1453 R, on 30 May 2021 - 02:50 PM, said:

I mean, one easy way to improve the light and medium 'Mech Joch Experience right off the bat is to eliminate Domination as a game mode. Domination is probably as close as you'll ever really come to Space Diabetes and may be a contender for the worst-designed game mode in any game in the history of gaming - specifically because it absolutely and utterly prevents any form of maneuvering by either team.

Please, this is right up there with the guys that whine about Nascar. I mean, at least in a match that devolves into Nascar people are moving and trying to get an angle of attack on the enemy. Domination just tends to give people a point to rotate around; not that it matters much, because they tend to put the domination point right where people would normally Nascar around anyway.

As for "worst designed", spoken like someone that never saw assault with base defense turrets. See, back in the day, MWO players whined about people capping the bases in Assault. So, after a while, PGI (the people the player base has whined doesn't listen to them since day 0) responded by placing automated defense turrets at the bases. This created problems. It stagnated play badly, especially on old River City and Caustic Valley where the redonkulous range the turrets had combined with areas with long sight lines caused every match to devolve into a long range poking match where any attempt at closing with the enemy resulted in turret sensor locks giving your position away and turrets and enemy players raining all sorts of holy hell down on your head.

[KaptinOrk]

1453 R, on 30 May 2021 - 02:50 PM, said:

I mean, one easy way to improve the light and medium 'Mech Joch Experience right off the bat is to eliminate Domination as a game mode. Domination is probably as close as you'll ever really come to Space Diabetes and may be a contender for the worst-designed game mode in any game in the history of gaming - specifically because it absolutely and utterly prevents any form of maneuvering by either team. You gitch'er giant metal-plated posterior in the pee stain, you keep yer giant metal-plated posterior in the pee stain, you fight on that hill and you die on that hill - whether you're built as a Stand And Deliver close-range slugfest brawler or not. It's absolutely terrible and any pilot that favors mobility over Fatness hates it.

Which probably explains why it's by far the most popular/voted game mode - every single goddamned Fatbro pilot out there picks it so they can ignore light or medium 'Mechs and do their best to grind their fatness against the other team's fatness in the most bizarre, nonsensical and slightly-offputting display of Giant Metal Slightly Sexual Space Sumo the world has ever seen, except without any of the skill, talent, athleticism or sportsmanship of actual sumo.

Holy **** I hate Domination so much...

Heavies and assaults get Domination, lights and mediums get Conquest, so it kinda balances out, IMO.

[1453 R]

Nascar is a player problem, and basically arises because three quarters of all the maps Piranha puts out are centered on some massive obstruction in the center of the map that allows zero real maneuver. Nascar arises because players are trying to find beneficial engagements and the only real way to do so is to curl around the Giant Cover D*ldo in the middle of the map. There's exactly two directions they can go, and the only real way to win for most folks is to manage to curl around one direction faster than the enemy can curl around the other and start defeating their enemies in detail. The better way would be to avoid the Giant Cover D*ldo in the first place and fight just about literally anywhere else on the map, but alas - Puglandians don't believe in battles of maneuver. They wanna shoot robits, and the Giant Cover D*ldo is where robits can be found, so to the Giant Cover D*ldo they go.

Note that Rubellite Oasis is built the opposite way - a large, open mosh pit in the center surrounded by plentiful cover, and it is by far the best map in MWO and the one map were Nascar doesn't really happen. The new Canyon also dispenses with a Giant Cover D*ldo in exchange for a more barren central zone and more plentiful/easy-to-use cover around the edges of the map, which makes it a vastly better map and reduces instances of Nascar.

Faster 'Mechs can sometimes circumvent Nascar by taking inefficient routes to arrive in places their enemies aren't expecting them to be, either splintering the enemy's Combat Blob as people try and react to a fast flanker opening butts or pinning reds in place long enough for blues to get an angle and fall on them, but it's a race against time. The fast flanker needs to get the job done Pee. Dee. Kyew - what most 'fast flankers' get wrong is the idea that they can pick their engagement time. When you break off from the main body of your team, you're awarding the enemy a power play. Your maneuver needs to pay off before your enemies can capitalize on the numeric advantage you're giving them, or you're wasting your time and your teammates armor.

But this also relies on one's teammates being prepared to jump with alacrity and aggression on the openings the fast flanker produces. They need to be able to recognize that momentary opening in the enemy Combat Blob and drive into it, use that brief window of redirected focus to drop someone and start manufacturing a hard advantage. And...well. MWO Puglandians are legendary for their absolute cowardice and their supreme and unquenchable dedication to the notion that creating the edge needed to win a game is Someone Else's Job. So much of the time, the Flank Poke results mostly in a fast 'Mech dying in a fireball after trying to engage one time too many and encountering enemies prepared for them, because their team has left the fast flanker out to dry.

Domination magnifies this whole thing a hundredfold. Frankly, Dom is sorta Nascar The Game Mode - it demands teams Combat Blob harder than any other mode, and it ensures that the inefficient long routes fast flankers rely on to try and surprise their enemies are an even worse idea than usual. Domination seems to bring out the worst in Puglandians - they absolutely will not jump on their enemies until and unless they have a 3+ kill advantage, and never mind that somebody's gotta manufacture that advantage in the first place by engaging the enemy at more even numbers.

Blugh.

Edited by 1453 R, 30 May 2021 - 08:22 PM.

[Khobai]

nascar is not a player problem. its a map design/map flow, gamemode, and gameplay problem.

You yourself even admitted nascar happens because the maps are often designed around a central element thats undesirable to be inside of so both teams try to stay on the edge of it. thats a map flow problem.

Combine that with the fact you have drastically different speeds of mechs that get separated out by their speeds with both teams rotating to try and kill off the other team's stragglers. the counter clockwise rotation is caused by the rightside weapon bias on many mechs.

there are very specific reasons nascaring occurs. and theres specific ways to prevent it. for example nascaring doesnt occur nearly as often on maps like solaris city because theres lots of cover and chokepoints which slows teams down and rewards teams for good positioning and setting up ambushes/crossfires. Crimson straits is another map you dont get nascaring as much on... again because youve got chokepoints and lots of cover.

the maps nascaring happens on the most are maps like caustic valley, river city, frozen city, etc... where you have some central element thats the only source of cover so teams have to stay close to it and theres unrestricted movement around the perimeter of said central element because of a general lack of chokepoints/cover, etc... or in the case of polar highlands the entire map is like that.

fixing nascaring can be done in part by filling up the empty spaces of those maps with cover, chokepoints, etc... anything that allows for tactical movement.

the other part is addressing the gamemodes themselves. since in most of the gamemodes killing the enemy team is essentially all that matters, and killing off enemy assaults is high priority, it contributes to nascaring because both teams want to move in a way that lets them get at eachothers assaults. while nascaring still happens in conquest its certainly less prevalent then in skirmish. while nascaring is super prevalent in domination. So proper gamemode design can definitely influence nascaring as well.

Edited by Khobai, 31 May 2021 - 06:46 AM.

[Escef]

1453 R, on 30 May 2021 - 08:20 PM, said:

Domination magnifies this whole thing a hundredfold. Frankly, Dom is sorta Nascar The Game Mode...

Wait, didn't you just say...

1453 R, on 30 May 2021 - 02:50 PM, said:

Domination is probably as close as you'll ever really come to Space Diabetes and may be a contender for the worst-designed game mode in any game in the history of gaming - specifically because it absolutely and utterly prevents any form of maneuvering by either team.

So, which is it? Does it prevent maneuvering, or is it Nascar The Game Mode? You don't even have a consistent complaint here. How are we supposed to take you seriously? You can't have it both ways, man. The game mode does not put mechs into some kind of quantum super position where they are simultaneously stationary and Nascar-ing.

Make up your mind.

[1453 R]

@Escef

Nascar is not maneuvering. Simply moving is not the same as maneuvering. At least, not to me. Combat Blobbing in a vague counterclockwise spiral like the world's laziest hurricane.

Maneuvering is when a 'Mech moves with aggression and alacrity, following routes or taking locations with a plan aforethought and intent to do the enemy harm. Maneuvering is when a fast 'Mech takes a wide circle around cover at their best speed to try and find vulnerable butts. Maneuvering is getting the team to fall back away from whatever the Galactic Standard ****** Choke is for the map you're on and forcing your enemy to advance into less favorable terrain. Maneuvering is when your agile medium-weight LRM machine sets itself up to fire along the enemy's lines rather than lobbing shots at ****** locks from outside your missiles' effective range, pressuring the enemy to move or break up to avoid your attacks.

Maneuvering is recognizing that the fight you're currently fighting is not advantageous to you or your team, and thus ditching that fight to find a better, more advantageous fight somewhere else. Nascar-style Combat Blobbing is never advantageous to anyone - it's just an attrition-based coin flip as to which side wins in the end and neither side will have deserved the victory. Domination ensures that if you do anything other than Combat Blob on the pee stain, you lose. Thus why I absolutely hate it - it forces the absolute worst kind of MWO peeky-pokey hide-and-cower chickendickery ********.

[Escef]

1453 R, on 31 May 2021 - 07:25 AM, said:

@Escef

Nascar is not maneuvering. Simply moving is not the same as maneuvering. At least, not to me.

Ah, the No True Scotsman fallacy, nice.

[1453 R]

Heh. That's a fair shake. I don't necessarily agree, but I'm also one of those who believes MWO is at its best when multiple smaller fights happen all over the map rather than just one big infuriating flip-a-coin Combat Blob in the middle. When people engage each other in ones, twos or threes as they push and jockey for position instead of just waiting for lucky entropy to do their work for them and try to force a whole-*** full company fight. Domination makes that fundamentally impossible so I hate it, but what's my opinion matter? Heh, I'm a bargain basement jackhole back after three years away from this mess, so eh.