153 replies to this topic

[TibsVT]

After having been informed of a few things I did not know prior to my post and after having seen Timber Wolf artwork drawn by the concetpy artist of MWO (Alex Iglesias). I'm happy to say I'd be satisfied with the launcers being part of the side torso and have altered my vote accordingly. My reasoning is from this:



It's the D configuration; but as you can see the launchers are not too horribly large, I'd imagine the launchers on the top would remain the same size as they would be pods and the LRM-20's themselves would just "slide" in the empty space. We need to remember in this very precarious scenario that it is a fictional game. PGI, hypothetically speaking, could just use those launcher pods as the generic size for all missile systems and only replace them when they are removed completely. It would work and it means balance. They aren't so large they they are a hinderance to the torso but not so tiny that they are not valid as a target.

Second point to note is that the legs and arms have a fairly large profile whereas the torso does not. It has been shrunk rather considerably compared to the standard Timber Wolf designs we have seen from the blueprints/cross-sections previously posted. This means that the various negative comments about how predominant the torso is are mostly dismissable. Yes the cockpit arguement is still valid but that aside the torso size is by no means a hinderance to the Mechs ability. Given it's speed and firepower you'd likely be more inclined to disarm the Mech then aim for the torso in most cases given how large the weapon pods in the arms are.

Also, I do wish to point out the one factor I wasn't aware of before, for anyone like me who didn't know. Apparantly, the Clan XL engine does not disable the Mech if a single side torso is lost. It requires the destruction of both sides to disable the Mech.

Given these three points and assuming the artwork from Alex is anything to go off I really don't see a need for the "ears" to be made seperate from the torso at all. I'd be more the comfortable piloting that thing given the significant profile changes Alex has made to that artwork. I say keep them as a part of the LT/RT.

Edited by KelesK, 01 July 2013 - 08:54 PM.

[ZionStation]

I don't understand, i am sure someone must have thought of some middle ground by now. I would think that the pods be separate from the Side, but if they are destroyed they wouldn't take the whole side with it, but if the actual side torso is destroyed then the pod would be destroyed also. This combined with other balancing ideas like sharing crit spaces, and ammo/weapon explosions transferring damage would make for good mechanics.

[PyroAcid]

the timberwolf is a omni mech http://www.sarna.net/wiki/OmniMech
just by looking at the picture above. the ammo is in the torsos that feeds into the pod,also if you look the shoulder pods are not part of the arms so . so yes on the seprate hitbox and seprate armor vaule so you got to balence armor for the pod and the torso but once the pod is destroyed no more damge to the dead pod gos to the torso, but if ammo expolison happens in the pod /torso it should go to the arms as well sence they are right under 2 or 3 tons of ammo. http://www.sarna.net...f_%28Mad_Cat%29 if your to lazy to read. the idea that a heavy 'Mech could move so swiftly while being as heavily armed and armored as the Timber Wolf was inconceivable. With its twelve tons of Ferro-Fibrous armor and arsenal that rivaled that of most assault 'Mechs of the era, it was completely alien to Inner Sphere military planners but also its a pod mount this means it can be a guass wolf,laser,autocannon,

Edited by PyroAcid, 03 July 2013 - 01:07 PM.

[Odins Fist]

Phelan Kerensky, on 09 January 2012 - 09:35 PM, said:

I believe the Timber Wolf should follow BT/TT Lore...

Since when has MWO stuck strictly to TT stats and lore..?? You know since they totally dropped the ball on Clan implementation or even introduction, and they "HAD" to drop the Inner Sphere News updates because their awful idea of announcing the timeline has backfired on them, and they officially stated that the timeline is no longer the dictating element that it was supposed to be, and is now just "FLUFF" <--- Fluff is a quote.

All bets are "OFF" on TT specs at this point in development, and MWO is only based on BattleTech to just such a degree when you look at the numbers, and has since the beginning of this project.

Odins Fist, on 02 July 2013 - 11:00 AM, said:

Wave 4 of operation revival... You know since Wave 3 didn't happen in June, or 1 and 2 at all either...

http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Twycross
.
http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Hot_Springs
.
http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Rasalhague
.
http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Hermagor
.
Etc, etc, etc, etc, etc...

Edited by Odins Fist, 03 July 2013 - 12:56 PM.

[Hellcat420]

they should be seperate from the torso since we have instant pinpoint weapon convergence. if there was instant pinpoint convergence in tt you can guarantee the lrm boxes would have been seperate hit location from arms/torso. battletech mechs were not designed to be used with things such as instant pinpoint convergence, heat capacity increses, etc so some changes will have to be made for them to be viable.(and yes i think the catapult should be the same way, at the very least the cats with the large missile boxes.)

Edited by Hellcat420, 03 July 2013 - 01:32 PM.

[Hulk Krogan]

Months ago when there were quite a pronounced amount of bugs, my HUD glitched as usual, but in the most peculiar way. The mech hitbox damage shower in your lower left HUD showed 2 missile racks exactly like a Timberwolf's above the side torsos. I absolutely swear to God I saw this. I don't know if it was just a concept the devs were testing, but its there. It was perfect in representation too, didn't look like some sort of graphics glitch either. Nothing to compare it too.

http://i.imgur.com/L4aWZum.jpg

this is a picture - exactly what I saw, so I can confirm that this isn't photoshop. (pretty sure the meme face was in my game too)

Not sure if this is common knowledge or not or if this was in this whole post somewhere (tl;dr), but there it is

[Nathan Bloodguard]

I think people would have to look at what the mech will look like for play in this game before going into this conversation to much more. I mean, are they going to have them 'stick up' like what people are thinking, or is it going to be more integrated into the side torso. Would it be far from the torso, or tucked in close? We don't even have a concept art for the mech in this game.

I would say try to tuck the missile pods into the torso a smidgin more then the 'classic' mech out there so that it would be harder to hit, but otherwise leave it in the torso. No need to complicate the game more for the sake of one mech. Also this mech has been in many games and seems to have survived well without the need to 'special' missile pod hit boxes. As for ammo explosions, the ammo in the launcher could explode and follow to the main bin, also keep in mind that this is a futuristic mech that might have sensitive equipment that might suffer catastrophic damage from such an event (without it possibly following back to the main ammo bins).

As a final note, I would like to point out the last time they made a 'special' hit box for a weapon (in MW4). It was on the Vulture's/Mad Dog's nose mounted omni gun rack. First shot of combat and whatever was on there was gone... just gone.

[Shiro Matsumoto]

Classic TT is enough.

[Z0MBIE Y0SHI]

It was a separate hit box in previous MW games, so why change it? And before the whole 'BUT DATS UNFAIR CLAN ADVANTAGE!' IS had mech's with missile pods as well...

[Egomane]

Z0MBIE Y0SHI, on 01 August 2013 - 08:12 AM, said:

It was a separate hit box in previous MW games, so why change it? And before the whole 'BUT DATS UNFAIR CLAN ADVANTAGE!' IS had mech's with missile pods as well...

Games? As in "multiples"? Tell me one that isn't MW4.

Btw ... I'm surprised this thread is still alive.

[CyclonerM]

Egomane, on 01 August 2013 - 09:10 AM, said:

Btw ... I'm surprised this thread is still alive.

Probably is because there is "madcat" in the title

[Z0MBIE Y0SHI]

Egomane, on 01 August 2013 - 09:10 AM, said:

Games? As in "multiples"? Tell me one that isn't MW4.

Btw ... I'm surprised this thread is still alive.

It's been a while, but I coulda sworn MW3 was the same.

[The Wiener Bandit]

People on this thread keep saying things like, "separate hit boxes would make the Madcat overpowered," or, "The hunchback has a big shoulder so it should get a separate hit box..." blah blah blah.

Clan mechs are SUPPOSED to be overpowered compared to IS mechs. That's the POINT of them. They will just have to be balanced with the other clan mechs.

Edited by OreoCookieSP, 19 August 2013 - 06:48 PM.

[CrashieJ]

the Madcat will most likely keep it's boxes, BUT we will have to see how they handle both the Thunderbolt and BattleMaster from the Pheonix Cashgrab


only then will we see what the mech's deal will look like