The6thMessenger, on 04 October 2021 - 05:14 PM, said:
This is a PVP game, we have to pick balance over lore, this is why IS-mechs are godquirked in comparison to clan-mechs, when in lore IS tech is comparatively ****. The more simmilar our tech and values get, the more consistent things become, and the more balanced they are. And that's why it's a hassle balancing MWO, it's because of asymmetry.
I mean consider Clan ERPPC, 6 tons, 15 damage, why would we settle with 10-damage 7-ton IS ERPPC? Clan Gauss is at 12 tons while still dealing 15 damage. Because of Clan's inherent superior technology is why balance-wise they have to feel comparatively **** to play.
I'd honestly rather nerf CERPPC at 12 damage with 11 heat and 4s CD.
So there are other ways of "balancing" than godquirks and messing with base values all the time, such as inaccurate weapons fire, heat scale penalties, per-instance override, uneven teams, etc.
Personally, rather than buffing the damage and nerfing the heat on all the weapons as was recently done, I would have been more okay with bringing cERPPC heat back up to 15 (where it's supposed to be, anyway) or even 15.5 or something, to force staggered PPC fire and make it harder to soak up the ghost heat, if incurred. IS MPLs start at 6/4 (dmg/heat), but I forget where they were pre-patch, or if they were changed at all. Raising their heat a bit would also have made them harder to use as effectively, and reduced their outlier status without affecting the wider array of weaponry nearly as much as was done, and without introducing the power jump (way more than a "creep").
Something else I might have preferred would be, instead of keeping up-front damage consistent with the different weapons, keep their DPS over 10 seconds consistent, instead. That way, you can adjust the up-front damage as much as you want, and adjust the cooldown to match, to maintain the DPS and HPS associated with the actual weapon system, also making one-shot kills with PPFLD much harder, increasing TTK. The whole balance of TT was the fact that damage was spread everywhere, and it was impossible to land every single weapon on the same component. That's one of the biggest balancing factors that's missing from MWO.
Gas Guzzler, on 05 October 2021 - 08:18 AM, said:
The story of BattleTech can come in the form of story/Faction Play, and we would all be for it. NOT balance.
Copying stats from a hilariously unbalanced table top game has nothing to do with story and is just bad online multiplayer game design.
Some of your suggestions just make the already grind-based game less friendly to newer players who now have to grind even more to have a balanced set of tools to use against their opposition. You even admit here that you have all the C-bills you would ever need, so OF COURSE you like the idea of buying yourself an advantage. No thanks, online PvP means level playing field.
You want unbalanced arms race with hordes of scrubs to grind through? Yes, go play MW5. Expecting that in an online PvP game is akin to living in fantasy land.
I want the story in here, and in Faction Play, too. That's been part of my request: divide everything up Clan/IS so the two tech bases can be balanced by asymmetric team sizes, which is another missing key balancing factor: Inner Sphere militaries know better than to take a fight where they are outnumbered by the Clans. Needing to pick a faction (any faction) encourages the user to learn something about that faction, or just teaches them about it once they've picked it (an even better method). Tool tips, 'mech selection options, camo patterns, whatever you want. Present the information about the chosen faction to the player. All they have to do is click one from a presented list, if they don't know anything about any of them, yet. At present, it is free and easy to bounce between them, but if implemented, this would have to be much easier to find and use than the current menu buried in the Faction Play area.
I know that this is a difficult request, and that PGI has been unable to fulfill it in the past. That's no reason to stop asking for it, and maybe someone else will gain access to the source code with the knowledge, ability, resources, and time to actually implement it. Okay, put it way down on the list of priorities, just don't dismiss it from the list entirely.
No, I don't want an arms race or a seal-bashing arena. (I don't really want an "arena" at all. I feel like retreating from a bad fight and carrying intel with you would be a useful mechanic in this game, but again: it has to be carefully thought out and coded to prevent insta-quitting, while allowing retreat from a stomp). I want role-based combat, where every 'mech has its purpose, and weaker 'mechs are cheaper, easier to come by, and sufficiently effective in large combined arms actions, but not able to stand up against an Atlas, or a Dire Wolf, without an extremely skilled pilot at the helm.
Okay, I have an ungodly amount of CBills on my main account. I've been giving them away to units just to get rid of them, except that those units have billions of their own CB that they can't spend. I want to be able to start a new account and actually have to work at obtaining and maintaining a 'mech. No, I DON'T want to just be "all set". The fun part of all previous 'mechwarrior titles was the early struggle with limited resources and a few light 'mechs to try and earn heavier chassis and enough money to keep them repaired, maintained, and equipped. I started a new MWO account to try and recapture that early economic struggle. I was able to buy an Executioner, two Mad Dogs, and a Viper (Ghost Bear-themed Faction deck) on sale (because those are nearly all the time, now) by the time I was done with my 25 Cadet matches, and I had them mastered in a week or two. It only took me a few more months to play all the different factions to nab the first 14 free 'mech bays and fill them with soon-to-be mastered 'mechs. Within 8 months, I had 40 'mech bays and 36 'mechs and enough money to fill the other 4 slots with Clan Assaults twice over (I was just being indecisive about what I wanted to fill them with). At that point, I'm bored with MWO. There's nothing left to do by then. That's when I start wishing that I only had one 'mech, maybe two, and that by having THAT 'mech, I provide whatever service that 'mech is good at to a team, or unit, or mission, etc, to earn enough to keep it maintained and pay my bills. 8 months to be "done" with MWO because I beat the game. That is WAY too short. That's when I really picked up my time on the Forums to try and suggest changes and improvements to the storyline and immersion to boost engagement and keep the game interesting beyond "gotta catch 'em all".
I'm a numbers guy. I like to think about this game when I'm not playing it, and I like to be able to understand a build when I see it facing me. I like to read the record sheets in my spare time, and have them cycling as a rotating desktop background. I want all of those numbers to remain consistent all the time so they match up in my head. THAT'S why I'm so **** about keeping everything consistent and within rounding distance of where they all started. That, and I REALLY am frustrated by pinpoint alpha strikes, because any time I try to play on Oceanic Servers, the 300 ping means that I can be destroyed before I know I'm being hit. If I get a ping spike on European, same thing can happen. I've even had North American matches where distant laser fire generates no sound, and no red "you're being hit from this direction" indicator. Only the paper doll updates with the damage. If there's enough of it, and it's pinpoint, I can lose entire prominent geometric features of my 'mech without noticing.
These are the issues I'm trying to suggest solutions for, but because I'm not a Comp player, my opinions are worth dirt.
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