64 replies to this topic

[verybad]

LordDeathStrike, on 14 March 2012 - 10:42 PM, said:

to sum up, extra open tonnage wont make your leg muscles work better, your engine still has the same output to drive them with, a half ton off of a 50 ton mech isnt gonna make it zoom faster.

Tell that to mechs that get an XL engine replacing their regular engine, and are suddlenly half again as fast (eg replacing a 50 ton mech's 200 rating engine with a 300xl engine. They don't require a myomer change to make this change in engine and gain the benefit, so you seem to be mistaken.

Edited by verybad, 14 March 2012 - 10:56 PM.

[Fluffinator]

Reply none of those. Extra weight converts to extra speed. If you want a 70 ton atlas that is somewhat fast so be it.

[LordDeathStrike]

verybad, on 14 March 2012 - 10:54 PM, said:

Tell that to mechs that get an XL engine replacing their regular engine, and are suddlenly half again as fast (eg replacing a 50 ton mech's 200 rating engine with a 300xl engine. They don't require a myomer change to make this change in engine and gain the benefit, so you seem to be mistaken.

if you replace a 200 with a 300 xl, you are generating that much more power, depending on the myomers max tolerance rating you will go significantly faster because of the energy increase. but you are still limited to the top speed the myomers can produce from their max power usage rating based on how many they are and how much strain they can take. an atlas has considerably more leg myomers then a hunchback persay due to weighing 2x as much.

if 2 fat kids both run for a cupcake from the same distance, the fat kid with more leg muscles and desire to get the cupcake will get there first.

[Trogusaur]

LordDeathStrike, on 14 March 2012 - 11:02 PM, said:

if 2 fat kids both run for a cupcake from the same distance, the fat kid with more leg muscles and desire to get the cupcake will get there first.

A rather demeaning analogy, but I will "run with it" (knee-slapper). Say one of those kids decides to lose weight and calls for a rematch. Then who do you think will win?

Edited by Lord Trogus, 14 March 2012 - 11:13 PM.

[devilkit]

LordDeathStrike, on 14 March 2012 - 10:42 PM, said:

to sum up, extra open tonnage wont make your leg muscles work better, your engine still has the same output to drive them with, a half ton off of a 50 ton mech isnt gonna make it zoom faster.

Based on physics and your explanation then we can both agree that the 'muscles' that drive the mech apply constant and consistent force to move, yes? Then that also means they exert a constant force as torque when in motion (the force needed to move large sums of mass) if the constant amount of torque in motion is applied on a larger mass it will move 'slower' while a lighter mass will move 'faster' but its still the same amount of torque applied in all cases. The amount of force applied in torque determines how fast motion can be made- whether its the legs walking/running, torso twisting, pointing arm mounted weapons to fire, etc. so dropping .5 tons is significant in the real world. (I know what I'm talking about I'm an industrial designer by education, mechanical engineer by need of profession)

But for the sake of game play balance, and video game physics and programming lets say a full 1 ton would grant roughly .25km speed and 1% animation speed but this is only allowed to a certain point depending on how the programmers (if at all) choose to implement such a game mechanic.

Again this is only an alternate suggestion, nothing to be taken seriously or argued about tooth and nail. Also your fat boy analogy is very poor as human beings are full of variables (diets, conditioning of the body, etc) mechs lack that variable as long as each one is kept maintained properly. A car that is maintained properly for example will perform better than the exact same car manufactured on the same day than one that has been neglected and maintained only 1/4 as much.

[Fluffinator]

If weight didn't effect speed sports cars and racing cars would not be so dead set on getting rid of every pound they can from anywhere they can.

[zverofaust]

Except Mechs aren't racecars and that's not how it works in the real world. You shouldn't be rewarded for inefficient use of space.

[LordDeathStrike]

at the end of the day TT mechs are designed to use all of the space and tons

if you have an open ton, all the weapons you can fire and enough heat sinks, you make sure your armor is maxed (changing engines isnt really an open in TT rules, not like mech 3 were you could put anything from the 10 to the 400 xl if it would fit into the same chasis).

so lets say your jenner has its max weapons payload, 2 missile wracks and 2 lasers if thats what it can fit, its got enough heat sinks to keep your fireing safely, and you have 2 tons of space, you can a: bring some more ammo for your missiles, or b: make sure you have max armor points, esp the legs since theyll want to slow you down if you are proving to be elusive.

now if you have max armor bringing more ammo is obvious, because in the TT running 2 tons light will not benefit you at all, but having 2 more reloads will if you dont get shredded.

and again, being a few % off max weight really wont influene your top speed, because you have a set rated top speed via your engine/legs myomers, its hard canon max speeds, its a mech sim, nerd rage wont change it. the best you could hope for is since you have a few % less mass you would accelerate and deccelderate a few % faster, but youre already the speed demon on the field in a jenner with masc.

ps modules take weight and criticals, im sure theres a module youll want if you have a free spot and ton, like ecm, eccm, artemis, bap, ect.

[Sylow]

Actually i am amused about the idea that reduced weight allows a mech to go faster. I now have the picture in my mind, where a badly shot up awesome runs circles around light mechs. (Hey! We had a TT game where we afterwards calculated that according to the damage the awesome took, it only weighted around 50 tons in the end. But still had its full reactor rating and leg actuators. )

Next to that, the old TT rules give a good reason against this concept. In the extreme environment rules, it was declared that high gravitation slows mechs down and while mechs in theory can move faster in low gravitation environments, security blocks them from doing so. A pilot can of course override those blocks, but has to make throws against taking leg damage whenever moving over the designs designated top speed.

The mass of a mechs leg will be the same, no matter the planets gravitation, thus the applied load to a legs joint increases (in square) to the increase of movement speed. If you move a mech at higher speed than it is designed for, you run a high risk of loosing your legs.

I'm looking forward to those reduced-weight machines, legging themselves even before having an enemy in range.

[Harlequin Wolf]

At the end of the day if you're in an 80 ton mech and you only use 79 tons how much faster do you think you could possibly be?

[Trogusaur]

zverofaust, on 15 March 2012 - 01:29 AM, said:

Except Mechs aren't racecars and that's not how it works in the real world. You shouldn't be rewarded for inefficient use of space.

Ironic you would mention that, because conventional 'mechs don't exist in the real world.

Edited by Lord Trogus, 15 March 2012 - 07:15 AM.

[Black Sunder]

I voted nothing. Its up to you to fill that tonnage and space however you can. If you don't its your loss and the opponent's gain.

[TheRulesLawyer]

So you guys saying that the max mech of the mech is based on the max speed of the myomer bundles and not on power. How do you reconcile that typically you'll move faster downhill than on level ground? Or that to recover from falls, or to kick, etc you'd all require higher myomer contraction speeds than the nominal running speed. The simple answer is that its based on mass, not contraction speed. There is plenty of headroom built into the max speed of the muscles. This of course means that removing weight would improve the power to weight ratio and increase acceleration and top speed.

To those worried about being rewarded for not using tonnage- There is always a better use for tonnage than empty weight. The devs have stated you can change engine size, so even bumping that up would be better than leaving it empty. This isn't the TT and we don't need to stick to engine sizes and speeds in strict multiples of the mech weight. That's one of the things that really does make sense to change in a computer sim. A 50 ton mech using a 300 rating engine should be slower than one using a 310 rating even if that's not strictly legal in TT terms. That's all a byproduct of using hexes.

It would even be sort of cool to see mechs gain a little speed as they burn off ammo, or even lose a limb. So yes to dynamically calculating speed based on actual weight vs power. Heck we could even do fun things like make engine hits and leg crits have a minor effect on speed even if it's below the threshold you'd need to see it in the TT.

[MilitantMonk]

If you strip down a street car to just the essentials you don't get an Indy Racer. If the mech was designed for specifications changing those isn't always positive. Yeah being under max weight may increase movement speed but how hard on the gyro would it be to compensate for that? Would removal of a heavy weapon and the lack of a counter weight cause stress on a chassis in weird places? That's the real world issues with such things.

It is a game though so it could be done, but I feel it's too much programing for very little payoff so the odds of it happening are close to nil.

[Michael Rosario]

What can I say that hasn't already been said?

Personally, I like mechwarrior because it ISN'T armored core. Mechwarrior isn't just another giant robot button masher, it's a giant robot simulator. Thus, it comes out as being a bit more grounded in reality. Yes, it's not completely accurate, but it is pretty good at not ripping the laws of physics to shreds and spitting on their graves.

To settle this once and for all, let's do an experiment. Have someone here grab a backpack and fill it to the brim with rocks, stones... lead ingots, if they have any, and run the 200 meter dash. See how fast they did it, then the next day have them do it again... without the backpack. My money's on the second time being faster. It's not because they magically got stronger muscles, either. It's because with much less weight, you can "spend" less of your force supporting that weight and more of it propelling yourself forward as fast as possible.

[TeaL3af]

I think extra speed would be fine. If you want a faster Mech with less gear I don't see why it would be unbalanced.

[Namwons]

If I downgrade my engine for extra weight...I should gain speed...no thanx

[SnowDragon]

Namwons, on 15 March 2012 - 02:48 PM, said:

If I downgrade my engine for extra weight...I should gain speed...no thanx

A legit point here....

[The Cheese]

Namwons, on 15 March 2012 - 02:48 PM, said:

If I downgrade my engine for extra weight...I should gain speed...no thanx

SnowDragon, on 15 March 2012 - 02:51 PM, said:

A legit point here....

Only legit if you haven't thought about it.

It's the power to weight ratio that we're really looking at here. A downgraded engine will presumably be lighter and produce less power. The power to weight ratio will differ a little, and the top speed would be calculated accordingly.

By your logic, you should get slower when you install a bigger engine just because it's heavier. You're completely forgetting about the extra power that you're getting which will cover the weight change.

Edit: Re-worded for clarity.

Edited by The Cheese, 15 March 2012 - 03:27 PM.

[Applejack]

My opinion is that you should not be allowed to build 'Mechs that don't fill their tonnage. Defies the whole weight scheme if you build an Atlas that is only 50 tons. Same deal if you build an Atlas that is 99.5 tons. You can always do something with half a ton, you can DEFINITELY do something with 50 tons. 'Mechs that don't live up to their potential should not be allowed on the battlefield.

Edited by Applejack, 15 March 2012 - 03:23 PM.