120 replies to this topic

[Max Killjoy]

TLBFestus, on 28 July 2012 - 05:48 PM, said:

Personally i think bringing melee into MWO will be a big negative for the game.

You'll end up with heavily armored griefers running around and totally demolishing the tactical aspects of the game.

If they do implement it, I hope it's as a desperate, no weapons left, melee attack that delivers weak damage.

Agreed.

Melee in MWO has too much potential to be like ramming in WoT.

[Guerra Mietitore]

Axman is actually how is its spelled, but F*** YEAH! He is in my top 5 favorite mechs! I am a melee guy so If I had to go to war, it would be a mech with melee capability. Axman being my favorite. He will mess you up.

[Primus Palus]

Considering the Devs said they're adding melee but it wont be ready for release... not sure what the poll would do. But I'm for it. It's realistic if you were to have a suit/vehicle like that. It just needs to be slow and do a LOT less damage than weapons.

[Fresh Meat]

This game is arcadey enough without giant swords.

I don't think the devs can do it well

Edited by Fresh Meat, 28 July 2012 - 07:14 PM.

[SakuranoSenshi]

Primus Palus, on 28 July 2012 - 07:04 PM, said:

Considering the Devs said they're adding melee but it wont be ready for release... not sure what the poll would do. But I'm for it. It's realistic if you were to have a suit/vehicle like that. It just needs to be slow and do a LOT less damage than weapons.

No... prettty sure that what they actually said is that they'd like to, if they can make it work properly.

[Carlton1228]

if it can be done right it'll be worth it.....i want to hear the lemindations of the heavies and assault jocks when i own them with the 30 tonner with a hatchet

[anglomanii]

SakuranoSenshi, on 27 July 2012 - 06:54 PM, said:

There are some sound reasons not to have it in at all, from gameplay and 'realism' arguments but it's also very much canon and can be a lot of fun so long as it's never 'easy mode win'. In fact, it really ought to be very much a last resort for most mechs and not necessarily desirable even for those mech adapted or built from the ground up for it. Personally, I'd like to see it be very ineffective and extremely likely to do more harm to the aggressor than the target until the pilot has spent time in dedicated mechs training for it. After that, I'd like certain mechs built for it or those adapted to it by grabbing a melee weapon to be effective for pilots with the skill tree and a very bad idea for most other pilots.

you've got to be some kind of can born clan jockey to be talking like that. Melee is an essential part of the IS Tactical Handbook* .

mwhighlander, on 27 July 2012 - 07:05 PM, said:

I will look forward to the devs NOT implementing melee (other than dfa, ramming) in the game for whatever reason and keeping with tradition of MechWarrior titles and it not being in the game.

oh lookie' someone else that's only played with mechs on a computer. see below for people that would explain this concept in a less insulting manner. I for one have see the lack of melee in previous MW titles to be a major failure and lack of fortitude in pandering to the less capable Mech jocks..

Tarriss Halcyon, on 27 July 2012 - 07:26 PM, said:

Now, let's think about this in terms of the canon. We're in 3049. Next year, the Clan War starts. We get mobbed. We eventually win, after a few years, but most planetary defense forces are depleted. What do we use?

IndustrialMechs. Yep, that's what I see coming from this. Logger-Mechs with chainsaws. MinerMechs with...uh....I think it was some kind of industrial hammer, but I don't remember. And you know what? I'm looking forward to it. This way, you can get some melee light mechs with very little armor and speed, but are capable of killing in close-range. Then there's Axeman. I'm drooling over that thing. Melee Medium mech? Yes, PLEASE. Atlas punching a Jenner into a wall? Very nice. Atlas refitted with melee weapons....never gonna happen, but would be nice. Valiant, with the axe and shield, another cool design. Melee opens things right up, and fits better with the canon where mechs are rarer. Granted, we all get mechs now, but what's to say they don't implement tanks and other units for us to tinker with.

As a final note, there's one last thing I think melee might open up for with the Clan invasion, and something that's got a couple of friends of mine, plus myself, extremely excited. Elementals.

yep i cant wait to stomp on toads.....that is what you meant..right? ;p

Wo0m3rA, on 27 July 2012 - 08:05 PM, said:

The tabletop rules/settings from Battletech are the very foundation of anything MechWarrior, and as anyone who knows the miniatures game rules will point out - Melee is covered under advanced rules.

So in other words "yes" melee combat should be implemented into any current PC based incarnation of the BT universe, it's a feature that's been lacking from prior versions of MechWarrior.

Other tabletop game features which require consideration for the PC version are the abilities for 'mechs to kneel or go prone and make full use of terrain for cover - once again covered under Battletechs advanced rules, and like melee, used by players of the TT version for near on 25 years.

Oh god yessssss!, you sir, i salute, if we go down the road of Maximum Tech* surely the Advanced and Master* rules must be included and dare i say Unbound*, no end of punching, kicking, clubbing, pushing, charging, DFA , mech lift capabilities (that's why you have mechs with hand actuators) and being able to flip arms....also there really is nothing like using your hands to make elementals pop like an over-ripe banana (and we all know we have less than 12 months before the clans invade)

so IMHO, melee is essential. No ifs, buts, maybes. If Melee is not in the game then your not playing a true representation of the system..

*to those that get this reference. i salute thee sirs.

[Keifomofutu]

Max Killjoy, on 28 July 2012 - 06:46 PM, said:

Agreed.

Melee in MWO has too much potential to be like ramming in WoT.

Ramming is awesome in WoT. Its very high risk, has a very good chance of causing damage back to you, and is usually not worth it excepting certain ideal situations. Kinda how I would hope potential melee would be in MWO.

[SakuranoSenshi]

anglomanii, on 28 July 2012 - 07:32 PM, said:

you've got to be some kind of can born clan jockey to be talking like that. Melee is an essential part of the IS Tactical Handbook* .

Nope, I merely need to understand the technical challenges involved in implementing it at all and the much harder task of properly balancing it.

Edit: Furthermore, canon is that it was difficult to do without making a complete ****-up of it and getting killed instead, which is why those with the skill to use mechs as if they were giant gladiators were so lauded.

Edited by SakuranoSenshi, 28 July 2012 - 09:03 PM.

[GreyGriffin]

If melee is sufficiently awkward and brutal, and I am talking the Atlas shoves out its arm and the Awesome staggers back and takes damage, not grappling or fisticuffs, I think it definitely has a place. It just needs to feel visceral and mechanical, not just like typical FPS melee where you're playing the game where you're just swinging your arms and walking forwards, and if anyone walks into it, they're going to regret it.

A swift kick is actually one of the best weapons large assault mechs have against lights. The ability to fend off small harassers with your sheer physicality is really appealing, especially if you are in a mech like an Awesome.

[anglomanii]

SakuranoSenshi, on 28 July 2012 - 09:02 PM, said:

Nope, I merely need to understand the technical challenges involved in implementing it at all and the much harder task of properly balancing it.

Edit: Furthermore, canon is that it was difficult to do without making a complete ****-up of it and getting killed instead, which is why those with the skill to use mechs as if they were giant gladiators were so lauded.

so at what point did you think melee was ever going to be easy, what a useless argument. if one follows whats canon from TT/RP ect it should already be balanced.
your statement is invalid.

[OriontheHunter]

anglomanii, on 29 July 2012 - 12:10 AM, said:

...if one follows whats canon from TT/RP ect it should already be balanced.
your statement is invalid.

Ok...I new around here so there's a lot I don't know, but unless they are using Piloting and Gunnery skills in the background, it will not be balanced like the TT. It's the same problem that all of the Mechwarrior incarnations have had. If you go for a true sim then you have to incorperate both Piloting and Gunnery into the control machanics or you loose the TT balance.

Piloting a Mech is not like driving a tank, though the table top restricted your movement to a tank like manner, it was an abstraction to simplify the game, and as such the mechanics assume a lot of movements that are not represented in the rules. The easiest example of a type of movement the TT assumes is side stepping, remember the hexes in the TT are 30m across. I always assumed that these movements were impractical over distance, but useful for evasion, how else do you think you can miss with a punch or other melee type attack and not automatically crash into your opponent. Now if you remember, and for those who don't know, melee attacks in the TT are based off your Piloting skill, and if you miss you have make another Piloting roll or you fall, and falling always damages your mech, how much depends on the weight of your mech and the number of levels fallen, again for those who don't know.

Gunnery is another problem, the fps mechanic used in games, is completely unrealistic. It's impossible for the crosshairs on the reticle to be dead on target all of the time, as anyone that has used a scope can tell you. In a mech it's not even looking down the barrel, so the computer is using trigonometry to adjust the traverse and elevation of the weapons to make it line up, then you have things like gear lash and barrel whip that come into play, that even affect beam weapons. These are some of the reasons that you couldn't target specific areas of a powered up mech, without a clan targeting computer, in the TT.

So to maintain the TT balance these two skills must be either used in the background or must be driven by the users control inputs, for the latter type, you could do something like needing to hold the reticle on the targeted area for a length of time to represent giving the computer time to compute and align the weapons. Firing before then would result in inaccurate weapons fire. Piloting is tougher, as we don't have a neurohelmet to feed us balance info. The best idea I've come up with would be to use a visual overlay that appears when you need to make a piloting roll. The overlay would be some kind of simple visual representation of the mech being off balance if your trying to avoid a fall and you have to get it back in balance, or if your making a melee attack the mech is balanced but you need to unbalance it in the correct direction to get the weigh of the mech behind the blow. The controls for doing this would simply be the mechs movement controls.

Without Piloting and Gunnery in the game in some way you just won't get the same balance that the TT has. The fps mechanic is the primary reason why previous games armor and weapons were out of balance with the TT, and if you don't have Piloting in there somehow, melee attacks will be out of balance as well. Take DFA for example, if you miss you automatically fall taking 3x the fall damage of a 0 level fall. It's supposed to be a high risk manuver not a common tactic, without some form of piloting mechanic it becomes out of balance from the TT, as there's no real risk to doing it.

Edited by OriontheHunter, 29 July 2012 - 12:01 PM.

[Elessar]

Melee combat has been an important part of my Battletech TT games and something that I definitely was missing in the Mechwarrior games. So I´m definitely pro implementing melee combat in MWO

Edited by Elessar, 29 July 2012 - 12:15 PM.

[wanderer]

Seabear, on 28 July 2012 - 01:09 PM, said:

Just do not turn this game into a series of boxing matches!

Some of my most satisfying fights have been watching someone charge my LRM-packed Archer, then kicking or charging the offending 'Mech into the group when it failed to realize that 70 tons of 'Mech kicks like a Gauss Rifle to the knee, and rams like a fusion-powered freight train. The idea of plowing into someone at the edge of the caldera on Caustic and watching them bounce down the mountainside with Cryengine ragdoll physics?

Oh, that sounds very nice indeed.

[James Searcy]

While it's from the tabletop and I'm all for that, in the context of this game I am unsure of its value.

A tabletop hex is by its nature an abstraction and the ability to melee-attack is somewhat glossed over by being able to attack adjacent hexes and the use of the turn system to let you move to contact. In a video game, there is no such abstraction. You will actually have to close those last sixty to zero meters represented by adjacent hexes and make the attack against an enemy who can move as you are moving and has every reason not to let you.

All he has to do is keep ten or maybe fifteen meters of distance from you, anything else is just gravy. That wouldn't be very hard in any previous MechWarrior game. So while it may be cool, I'm deeply suspicious of it being actually useful.

Edited by James Searcy, 29 July 2012 - 02:52 PM.

[Randall Flagg]

...or a Lacrosse stick for the Atlas so I can launch Jenners like a Trebuchet into other enemy mechs.

[justin xiang]

I was never much into melee weapons on mechs but I have always liked melee with punching and kicking. Punching=pretty weak but I love to give a nice kick to another's mech and watch their legs go out and their mech topple to the ground. My all time favorite melee attack (from the board game) is pushing a mech off of a cliff .

Also, flipping arms is a big _plus_. Love running my catapult in the opposite direction of the opponent with my arms flipped around .

[Tal Kath Naabal]

Melee = Yes

[OriontheHunter]

James Searcy, on 29 July 2012 - 02:52 PM, said:

While it's from the tabletop and I'm all for that, in the context of this game I am unsure of its value.

A tabletop hex is by its nature an abstraction and the ability to melee-attack is somewhat glossed over by being able to attack adjacent hexes and the use of the turn system to let you move to contact. In a video game, there is no such abstraction. You will actually have to close those last sixty to zero meters represented by adjacent hexes and make the attack against an enemy who can move as you are moving and has every reason not to let you.

All he has to do is keep ten or maybe fifteen meters of distance from you, anything else is just gravy. That wouldn't be very hard in any previous MechWarrior game. So while it may be cool, I'm deeply suspicious of it being actually useful.

It should be just as 'useful' as the TT, by what you've outlined. You could avoid melee range in the TT as well, unless terrain or battle conditions prevented you from doing it, granted you can now avoid melee at far closer ranges, but not as easily as your making it sound, a mech can't back up as fast as it can move forward, so to move as your opponent you have to 'turn your back' to them, which generally means not being able to fire at them. Then you have mechs of different speeds to consider, so it should be able to be used, just not always and not against every opponent on the battle field, unless they're willing to engage in it as well.

Since I forgot to mention in my previous post, I'm definately pro melee in the game, I'm just not expecting to compare it to the TT version, very closely.

[light487]

Yes ok.. but I hope it doesn't turn the game into Gundam....