244 replies to this topic

[UncleKulikov]

Probability hit location primarily, with player skill making up some difference.

[CrescentHawk]

Another thing I forgot to mention with my first post is the affects of pilots skills. They have mentioned that your pilot/mechwarrior will have skills and one those skills could be to reduce the size of the reticle or reduce the time it takes for the reticle to shrink.

Edited by CrescentHawk, 02 November 2011 - 07:38 PM.

[Big Red]

Probabilistic would be best because we aren't really climbing into 20-100 ton Mechs and blasting seven shades of **** out of other 20-100 ton Mechs. So many factors would go into any single firing of each weapon that would all alter the effect of that firing and also have an effect on future firings. Things such as (but not limited to)

Residual heat
Damage to a location (various mountings and actuators)
Stance of the firing mech
Pilot condition (that dodgy curry last night could ruin more than just your clockwork bowel movements)
Terrain & weather

[DamoclesGuard]

My vote is for what the OP Lentil said. Random locations inside the reticule. With the reticule being modified by movement, heat, ect...

To me that would be the perfect balance/compromise between the TT and the old PC games.

[Argroh Valdios]

Personally, I'ld say both probalistic and skill based.

wouldn't get into the details, but this is what I believe is the way to go.

[Sirius]

I'm pretty staunchly in the "pilot skill" camp. I'm sorry, but if you suck at aiming, that should have consequences. The rolling to hit that BTech did was supposed to simulate pilot skill - in a shooter video game, we can do better than that.

[Ozver]

Oh man, I voted wrong. Probability is the thing really way better than direct point hit. This model also assumes fully equipped electronic warfare and countermeasure mechs which will be able to, for example, jam radar, distort viewport, paralyze weapon systems or gyroscopes, expand allies sensors et c. - so let the chaos be involved in aiming. Alpha volley must not be so critical as in MW4 I think.

Edited by Ozver, 03 November 2011 - 12:05 AM.

[Grifin]

I would go with Probabilistic It same to take in the ability of the player with the ability from the game.

[Odin]

Pilot skill.
A hit is a hit ****.
But, I would love to see our avatars stats(RPG) and a detailed, actually very detailed Mech model, say gyros, speed, running ground to determinate how easy-steady you hold your aim.

Weapon modeling, penetration, ballistics should take range into account too.
In no way a fired gaus shell can vanish into thin air after 1201 meters, like it was in MW4.
Excellent postings here.

Edited by Odin, 03 November 2011 - 12:22 AM.

[VYCanis]

i don't like probabilistic, i prefer skill based. The crosshairs should be bouncing and swaying and shaking with your movement, recoil, and incoming hits, but where they are pointing is where your shots should be landing, its just a matter of aiming them right in spite of everything.

however i do think certain ACs should have slight cone of fire, just slight.

and yeah, i do like the idea of weapons going past their usual listed ranges, as battletech ranges were only so short for the purpose of dinner table space, we have much more room available in video game space, that space should be taken advantage of to the point where projectiles don't just evaporate in midair, lasers don't just hit an invisible wall.

[Infine]

Sirius, on 02 November 2011 - 11:41 PM, said:

I'm pretty staunchly in the "pilot skill" camp. I'm sorry, but if you suck at aiming, that should have consequences. The rolling to hit that BTech did was supposed to simulate pilot skill - in a shooter video game, we can do better than that.

Pilot skill in tabletop is accouned for by... Ahemmm... Pilot skill modifiers. The best of the best elite pilot in tabletop can't reliably core a running mech across 800m (ok, tabletop has shorter ranges, but still). Every monkey who can hold a mouse can do it in MW4.

So probablistic. As in weapon spread and environment modifiers. With individual crosshair for each weapon. Also. Even if we account for torso mounted weapons, tabletop wise they have a targeting cone of 60 degrees (or at least they should have some vertical aiming system) so they are not nailed hard to the mech body. This can also help eliminate the usual ridicolous stuff like shells and laser beams disappearing mid-air because OOPS! OUT OF RANGE! Maximum effective range is a range where it becomes near impossible to hit or where weapon loses it's power. Not where shot transcends to a higher plane of existance.

However the poll choices are misleading. Landing a shot that requires accounting for probablistic deviations is also a skill.

[Teggs]

CrescentHawk, on 02 November 2011 - 06:46 PM, said:

I also think the effect of moving should be more significant. Don't just make the reticle larger but actually have the screen bouncing around. The faster your mech is moving the more it is bouncing.

I agree that a mech moving quickly would not be a steady firing platform. However, 'bouncing the screen' would make a good number of players nauseous.

- Teggs

[Kargush]

I voted skill, mostly because I didn't read the first post (d'oh!).

That said, I like the model used in games like ArmA. You aim at the head, the shot(s) will go to the head. But if you're running along or otherwise under effects like pain or whatnot, your aim will drift and the reticle will expand or contract. Of course, if you're aiming centre-mass, chances are all shots will hit centre-mass, especially on a large target or if you're close. What I'd like to see would be a fine marriage between skill and probability.

So I guess I should have voted probabilistic. Oh well.

[Souske Sagara]

Probab gives the best development flexibility, and rewards good skill, but not so much so that it kills noinks before they can love the game. If this turns out as a complete tactical sim then let the TC work it out, otherwise pilot skill and conditions should modify player skill.

then again my reactions have slowed since I left puberty so I am biased against reflexes.

[diana]

Pilot skill only. Random luck factor should not be such an important role. I can understand shots not being 100% accurate, but unless your aim is thrown off when you are hit\in other way, your shots should land, at least, very close to your target point.

[GoatHILL]

I voted skill but it should be tried to the reticle. Your shot would fall randomly inside the reticle if you want to head someone make sure the reticle is smaller than the mechs head.

[Captain Hat]

Personally I think the key is not to randomise the shots but to introduce deviation according to a set pattern. This will allow for skilled pilots/gunners to compensate for the inherent inaccuracy of their weapons while still reducing the silliness of an alpha-strike kill.

To explain what I mean: If your 'mech has an ER laser mounted in its arm, the mount isn't always going to be perfect, and the arm's actuation isn't always going to be spot perfect either, so at 800 metres, there's a good chance the beam will not bisect the crosshair point perfectly. However, the thing is mechanically attached and doesn't flap about at random, so the next time you take your shot the deviation will be roughly the same, and you can compensate for it: It won't suddenly deflect five metres to the right of the original shot for no reason.

Real world autocannons don't deviate much, but when they do it's either according to the coriolis effect of a rifled barrel, the centripetal deflection from a rotary cannon or just the recoil from the previous shot throwing the gun off- and then there's the wind to take into account too. These things may appear random to the uninitiated, but all of them have specific effects- the gun's muzzle brake or autoloader system may cause it to consistently deflect up and to the left on recoil, for example- and while there will be a fraction more random error with autocannons most of the deflection from the target zone should, again, be predictable.

Then you have movement. Even without the screen bobbing, the aim points of the weapons on the mech will change noticeably as the 'mech moves. The arms will rock up and down, deflecting noticeably more than the body: Body-mounted turrets, like the Vulture's, will be able to maintain much more precise aim than any arm-mounted weapon system (and yeah, I know the Clans haven't arrived properly yet when the game starts, but it won't be long!) and each weapon will move differently depending on its weight, barrel length, the strength of its mounting and so on: While, again, these can seem like random movements, in reality they are not, and a skilled pilot will be able to compensate to a certain extent by timing his shots and adjusting his aim. You will never be perfectly precise this way, but if the deviation is according to rules rather than a random throw of the dice, then skill can have a much greater effect.

Note that skill in this instance is not just reflexes: Firing on the move is as much about timing and rhythm as it is about speed in this model, and since the arm actuators and torso of the mech will lag behind the controller's input, so is any kind of drastic change in aim- you need to be able to time your shots right, not just twitch them off.

Note that this will also mean that an alpha-strike will almost never all strike the same location: Different guns will have different deflections from the mount on upwards, so even while sitting perfectly stationary they will never all strike the same pinpoint. FOr example, the ER PPC on your Warhammer's left arm may deflect slightly up and to the right, but the one on the right goes slightly to the left instead, so at any range beyond about 500m you'll never land both guns onto the centre torso of an enemy unless you fire them one after the other, with enough of a delay between to allow your 'mech to compensate for the recoil of firing the first (and the speed of the second shot will depend on how good you are at timing the re-aim precisely and then compensating for the gun's inherent deflection).

It sounds like a lot to take into account, but first of all it's not really that bad- implemented correctly you won't really notice it a lot of the time after a while and only really pay attention to it when you're running or shooting at range- and secondly it would enable pilot skills that make a real difference from the RPG side without making top-level pilots virtually invincible- for example, a higher-level pilot skill could be that firing shots at range will give you an "accurised" reticle for each weapon as your pilot gets used to its characteristics- so that the ER PPC that deflects up and to the left actually puts a dot on your screen slightly up and to the left of your main reticle when you have it ready to fire. The guns themselves won't get any more accurate, but it's easier to compensate for their inaccuracies this way.

In my opinion, that would be the ideal sort of system to have.

It does, however, require a lot of work to implement, so we'll probably just get a "random cone of fire" that shrinks faster dependent on pilot skill, gyros etc, WoT style.

Edited by Captain Hat, 03 November 2011 - 03:23 AM.

[Woodstock]

I'm actually very surprised at how divided the community is on this one ... Not sure probability is the best description of the second option.... within a variable sized recticle would be clearly the right choice. by canon and to engineer great fun gameplay (in my opinion)

[DreyfussFrost]

Probabilistic sounds good. You're right about always having all weapons hit a point dead-on is pretty unrealistic, and it would be interesting to have parts like enhanced targetting or sensors or such give you less weapon spread. The most important point though is how to deter boating. Of course I posted in the Mechlab thread that I think the game should have variants only, mostly for the same reason, but if that doesn't happen this could fulfill the same function. I'd like to see both, but PLEASE no target designation. If this was MechCommander Online then sure (and I'd love to see that), but it's MechWarrior so I'd like to do the shooting myself.

[Tyrant]

I would suggest people play WoT at Tier 8 to 10 and try and hit something on a tank at 300m, you will be happy if you can get a ricochet let alone a penetrating hit, most of the time a complete wiff and rage at the IS7 for having OP hit boxes and the inability to hit its weak points specifically due to the randomized aiming.

While shooters do have some randomization you will eventually aim well / long enough to be almost guaranteed a hit on what your aiming at. But generally speaking lots of randomization in shooters is bad as it creates unsatisfactory user experiences.

Edited by tyrant, 03 November 2011 - 03:41 AM.