Pht, on 19 April 2012 - 05:32 PM, said:
If I'm reading this right, the weapons hardpoints can change in size to take up whatever free criticals are in their location?
Yes. If you have a hardpoint, it will fit whatever weapons are in that category, provided you have the critical spaces available (per Table Top).
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I wonder if the free critical spaces have to be contiguous...
Table Top says (with a handful of exceptions like TSM) yes, so I presume MWO will also require contiguous criticals.
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I presume removing equipment (heatsinks, ecm, that sort of thing) will free up spaces around a weapons hardpoint?
I believe that has been confirmed.
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This is a min-maxer's paradise; munchkins almost by definition thrive on sorting tons of data to find that one setup that breaks the game; and with a lot of mechs to look over ... and of course, once the first really good munchkin finds the first really persistant design, it will start cropping up all over the place.
Since MWO relies at least partially on Table Top construction rules, then yeah, because Table Top rules allow for min-maxing. That said, I think the hardpoint system actually reduces the munchkins ability to min-max since it restricts the ammount of weapons that can be mounted period, and the ammount of weapons that can be mounted in a single location. Omnimechs, if/when they are released for Player use, will be the ones that are abused since realistically they should be able to mount any weapon, any where, in any ammount (although the ability to change engines, armor, and base heat sink levels will be removed).
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Also ... why on God's green earth would anyone EVER take anything less than what was, in the parent game, the biggest, most damaging weapon type for any "hardpoint" if that hardpoint can change size to fit the free non-weapons space around it? .... especially if people are allowed to strip out and free up spaces around those weapons hardpoints?
Because you still have weight and space restrictions to keep in mind. Sure you can slow a Locust down and strip enough armor to mount a PPC, but it will never fit because the energy hardpoint is in the Center Torso with only two critical spaces while the PPC takes 3. You could theoretically mount a PPC on a Commando in the slot where the Medium Laser went, but then thats all youd be left with.
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Which leads me to wonder... how can you remotely keep the battletech lore "feel" (gauss are scary, small weapons in large groups are scary, and so on) with this? ... any weapon which in the parent system had it's bulk/size as a major balancing factor would have to completely remade from scratch; with unintended consequences galore to deal with, leading to having to either scratch remake the armor and damage systems, leave out penetrating damge resolution or have to completely redo it (which is intimately involved with the sizes of equipment and weapons ... )
How far down the rabbit hole must a developer chase after that frantic rabbit before coming to their senses and realizing they're wasting their time when there's already a system built that has over 20 years of playtesting?
Wouldn't your time be better spent elswhere?!?
Weapons still have their traditional Table Top critical space requirements, so you can't mount three Gauss Rifles in a torso just because you have three ballistic hard points. In addition, mechs are limited by their overall number of hardpoints. If your mech only has 5 hardpoints (regardless of type), then you'll never be able to mount more than 5 weapons. Period.
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If the small weapons are left at their original damage potential, they'll practically disappear in any mech using heavy weapons that, in the parent system, took up lots of space as a balancing factor.
Those heavy weapons still have their critical space requirements.
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Smaller mechs as a weight class will have the paradoxically obscene advantage of having LOTS of hardpoints because they use a lot of weapons in some locations; how do you keep from seeing things like a light mech with a downgraded engine and armor strip toting, say, 3 ERPPCs, and being used as a heat-napping water loving extreme range sniper witha low visual and EM profile?
Not true. Very few canon light designs have a plethora of weapons, much less all located in one location. Again, the hardpoints are limited to the base chassis, so if your in a Jenner with 4 energy and 1 missile hardpoints, you will never mount more than 4 energy weapons and one missile weapon.
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This is doable at 4/6 with a 30 tonner using endo internals and an XL engine; and it's not a slug mech... in fact, that same light mech if it had any single ballistic weapon could also mount a long tom, or an ac20, or a heavy gauss!
Ask anyone who has played a Hollander, which is exactly what you just described, and they'll tell you it sucks. Its a one trick pony that is not fast enough or heavily armored enough to stand up to determined opposition. As with most snipers, it requires a relatively clear field to operate effectively and can be easily swarmed by other light mechs that are faster but carry the same effective firepower in smaller weapons.
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Any assaults that, in the parent game, didn't use a lot of small weapons will quickly be shelved by most players. This system makes any mech that uses a lot of weapons more desireable than any assault that, say, uses a small number of weapons that took up a lot of space in the parent game; and the same applies for the rest of the weight classes.
Perhaps. 'Mechs like the TBolt and Warhammer that use a large number of smaller weapons in addition to their big guns will be popular, but so what? That actually follows canon, and so long as critical space requirements, balanced by heat, speed, and armor trade-offs are kept in check, we're not going to see any overtly outragous customization (at least not any more than any previous MW games).
I think you may have some misunderstanding on how it works. The limiation on weapon type and number, between hardpoint allowance and critical space requirements, should alleviate most boating/min-maxing. I hope the designers will stick with traditional Table Top engine size requirements (i.e. you need to jump an entire engine size to bump speed, rather than doing it incrementally like MW4), which will further prevent min-max tweaking, especially on assaults where the next engine size could eat between 10 and 30 tons. XL engines, double heat sinks, endo steel, and ferro-fibrouse will likely consume their table top level of space requirements, further limiting space for weapons and equipment. Overall, I think its obedience to table top rules and restriction of the hardpoint system will be a nice balance all around.
Edited by MajorTom, 20 April 2012 - 06:36 AM.
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