53 replies to this topic

[Odin]

Ok.

Of course, a mech game should stay true, to the core and sense of the battletech world.
Applying to what once made a mech noticeable for what it ment to be.
Otherwise, we had some tank game with, well, funny looking tanks, right?

However, be that as it may, face it lads, roll dice rules translate very bad into a real time environment.



How wants to face a shadowcat with 30+ smallaser, if you actually could see that modeled/rendered on screen infron of you - I say the bad word - realistically? What sad looking thing that would be! If you actually could see the change you made with the **** thing. Alphastriker look silly, are probably true to BT rules set and are only theoretically possible, but a laugh about what BT is at heart IMHO.

I hope the Devs find the balance between the possibilities of modern day PC hard- and software and the core of BT.
Not all the rules, coming from a different medium (tabletop), translate into a PvP real time environment.

[UncleKulikov]

Ablative armor needs to stay. With the number of hit locations the OP wants, on top of the sloped armor and advanced ballistics, hitting targets would be incredibly inconsistent.

And when armor is struck and damaged, it loses integrity. Any kind of armor. Keeping the ablative portion makes more sense for this game.

[AlanEsh]

gilliam, on 03 November 2011 - 09:02 AM, said:

I'll grant you the critical system and fixed locations that are on the tabletop by nescesity, can be done away with for a video gaame, but I can't agree with armor. I don't see what's wrong with ablative armor.

Ablative armor makes weapons too similar. Every weapon has a damage value and that's all that matters when the projectile hits the target. So you're either going to rip off some armor equal to your damage output, or you're going to break some internals if there is no more armor.

I suppose the same can be said for a pure penetration+critical damage system (a la World of Tanks). If your gun can penetrate, you're going to do some damage, if it can't you won't.

I'd like to see a combination of the two, where you can score penetrating hits with many kinds of weapons, with an varying chance of doing so depending on the weapon's characteristics. Some will rip off a lot of armor but have little to no chance of penetrating until most of the armor is ablated.

Which brings up another point... internal damage and crits should very rarely be impossible to achieve. Highly unlikely when armor is fresh? Sure. But as the armor is ablated and degrades, the chance of putting a second shot into a gaping hole should be there.

[VYCanis]

an example, i think, of how extreme range could work.

Gauss rifle vs AC20

Gauss rifle, very slow ROF, very high recoil, very high damage, precision accuracy, nearly instant projectile impact, and no noticeable drop at the ranges the game takes place in.

infantry equivalent, designated marksman rifle

AC20, moderate ROF, substantial recoil, high damage, fairly accurate up to a point, relatively slow projectile speed (think battlefield 2 tank cannon projectile speed) and a significant amount of drop at long range that needs to be accounted for.

infantry equivalent, an automatic shotgun firing slugs.

While both can send their projectile out to very far distance, the gauss truly excels at it, being more likely to hit, as it has less factors to compensate for, and lumps its damage into one shot. At close range though, its slow rate of fire makes it awkward to use in a brawl, where every miss is a massive setback.

The ac20 while it can hit out to extreme ranges, as it's dividing up its damage into multiple shots, and has ballistic speed and drop factoring in, it makes it ill suited as a sniping weapon, but still a dangerous weapon in the hands of a skilled user. Up close as projectile speed and drop factor less and less, and DPS becomes more important, the ac20 handedly out competes the gauss rifle. since while each individual shot is likely doing less than the gauss, it can afford to miss because there is another shot coming up immediately after. POW POW POW.

a medium laser might do its normal damage out to 500m, then begin to degrade steadily thereafter to some mininum damage amount till the horizon. While an er medium laser might deal its normal damage out to 800m before starting to lose potency.
While both can be seen firing all the way to the horizon, the er model still has the range advantage. A large laser might push that range a bit farther and compress its damage into a shorter duration beam, making it far more effective than medium lasers at extreme ranges.

Machineguns should be able to fire out to well past a kilometer, however their damage per round should sharply decrease past a relatively close range. Combined with the already low damage and the large number of rounds needed to hit the same area to do anything, at long range they simply are an annoyance as they will do little more than strip paint off mech armor. but can still be useful at destroying maybe light npc vehicles or npc infantry if they are ever included,

LRMs can hit anywhere any time, it just becomes a matter of getting the right spotters and sensor data. but in a tight brawl, they are awkward at best, useless at worst.
SRMS can go as far as you can aim em, but they are not designed for bombardment, so are limited by line of sight.

etc etc

so long as maps aren't simply flat open field, and aiming isnt easy breezy focus fire, having believable weapon behaviors with long *** ranges could still fit within the overall battletech game balance. the short range stuff can go out farther, but you'll still be relying on the long range stuff for long range. And sensor gameplay would become wickedly important as shots from beyond visual range would be very possible. lending real importance to AMS and ECM

[Gaius Cavadus]

Angelicon, on 03 November 2011 - 02:41 PM, said:

Ablative armor makes weapons too similar. Every weapon has a damage value and that's all that matters when the projectile hits the target. So you're either going to rip off some armor equal to your damage output, or you're going to break some internals if there is no more armor. I suppose the same can be said for a pure penetration+critical damage system (a la World of Tanks). If your gun can penetrate, you're going to do some damage, if it can't you won't. I'd like to see a combination of the two, where you can score penetrating hits with many kinds of weapons, with an varying chance of doing so depending on the weapon's characteristics. Some will rip off a lot of armor but have little to no chance of penetrating until most of the armor is ablated. Which brings up another point... internal damage and crits should very rarely be impossible to achieve. Highly unlikely when armor is fresh? Sure. But as the armor is ablated and degrades, the chance of putting a second shot into a gaping hole should be there.

I actually quite like the idea of a combination of ablative and penetrative armor models. I like the idea that you can weaken the integrity of the armor over time while still being able to penetrate it if the weapon being fired has the capability to do so. That's one thing that was always odd in World of Tanks; a tank could have 1 HP of hull left yet it's armor is as fresh and effective as the second it rolled into the match.

After some contemplation I would definitely like to see a combination of both models and I think categorizing weapons between penetration and ablation would be a solid concept. I think it's pretty clear that lasers and PPCs would handle most of the ablative work while ACs and gauss do the penetration and work over the internal hitpoints. It seems like missiles could possibly fill both roles and MWO could even offer multiple ammo types for missiles and autocannons (I'm basically thinking armor piercing and high explosive shells/warheads here). I guess ACs could also combo between penetration and ablation too.

One thing I'd really like to see though is that the armor condition or hitpoint pool is an independent pool from the internal structure hitpoint pool. The internal structure hitpoint pool should determine the actual "health" or integrity of that particular section.

Edited by cavadus, 03 November 2011 - 02:55 PM.

[wanderer]

It's also been noted about StratOps having a nice set of 'Mech modification rules.

Even if you made those auto-successes, you could quite reasonably charge people in terms of time and game-money for having a 'Mech modified. I'd actually be amused if they didn't and gave modifications the chances to go partially or totally haywire, just like the boardgame.

And if it gets destroyed, guess what? They don't sell new Centurions customized to the Mechwarrior. Get a new stock Centurion and start paying for the work once again. MWO being PvP, I can guarantee that if someone decides to pimp their ride, a bunch of folks on the other side are going to make sure that they can wreck that expensive toy...because that's human nature. On the other hand, it might very well encourage said custom-jobbers to be a little chicken when fighting...including running away when they start looking a bit dodgy. Psychology adds a little flavor here, and making major customizations chancy and expensive helps keep people in more standard 'Mechs/standard variants vs. trying to turn their 'Mech into a one-of-a-kind-wonder-of-the-Inner-Sphere.

[ice trey]

cavadus, on 03 November 2011 - 08:44 AM, said:

Many of the boardgame rules are really poorly done and translated to a virtual space in an even worse state.

Speak for yourself. As far as I'm concerned, Battletech is by far one of the best tabletop games on the market. A perfect balance of game detail versus speed of play, all with fewer units required to play.

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Mech customization based on critical slots. Hardpoints are the way to go. Only CBT purists would argue for the awful Awesome crit slot system. Because a Firefly really has as much physical space in the RT as an Atlas, amirite?

Irrelevant. Even huge 'mech weapons on an itty bitty 'mech can extend out of it. Please refer to Hollander. Besides that, the critical system is perfect in that it gives chances for critical hits.

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The entire ablative armor concept. Seriously, we need to move on to a real ballistics model whiich takes into account slope, angle, armor thickness, and penetration values. The sectional hitpoints need to be the internal structure's integrity, not a pool of armor.

Nope. 40K style "It hits or doesn't" armor has already been visited as being obsolete in-universe. The Abalative armor was made so that it could better absorb any and all weapon types, no matter how powerful. Old-style armor exists as Barrier armor, and it was said that even Age of War tanks with the strongest armor would get cored straight through with a single PPC or AC10 from the Mackie.

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Weapons having a maximum range. Yes, because there's a magical barrier at 400m where light simply ceases to exist for a medium laser. We need maximum effective ranges with damage dropoff beyond them.

While Battletech has rules for firing out into extreme or LOS ranges, the difficulty modifier to hit his superhuge. this would be the same as in-game. Do you really expect to be able to peg someone with a pistol, two kilometers away?
Also, those kind of ranges would turn this game into a Snipefest - Exactly what I DO NOT want to play. Counterstrike was a terrible game. Mechwarrior 4 online play is horrid due to sniping abuse.

Battletech and Mechwarrior were never any more "Realistic" than Star Wars or Star Trek. This is not a military simulation. This is Science Fiction - 25 years of fluff and history with over-the-top giant robots all in a tacticool shell. If you don't like that and expect the whole franchise to turn on it's head at the expense of all the long-term fans just because you can't suspend your disbelief, then maybe this is not the game for you.

[gregsolidus]

I wonder if the developers are getting tired of people thinking they're stupid?They will do what they did with Mechwarrior 1-4:Approximate rules that work,retools rules that kinda do,and not use those that don't.It's just that simple.

[Stormwolf]

gregsolidus, on 03 November 2011 - 03:27 PM, said:

I wonder if the developers are getting tired of people thinking they're stupid?They will do what they did with Mechwarrior 1-4:Approximate rules that work,retools rules that kinda do,and not use those that don't.It's just that simple.

Best comment in the entire thread.

[Gaius Cavadus]

ice trey, on 03 November 2011 - 03:23 PM, said:

Stuff.

So go play the boardgame.

[Bianca Flowers]

I'm going to say I want the exact opposite of this post.

I want the hit locations, armor, and hit points of the board game. Having 9 head armor, and armor maxes of 2x internal structure are only balanced in a random 2d6 roll, not being able to twitch fire your ERPPC at my head. Tactics as related to the existing battletech board game, NOT your skills at twitch in Call of Duty or the hyper-grognard World Of Tanks. Giant mechs are completely unrealistic in the first place. *** help you try to put realism in it!

[AlanEsh]

Bianca Flowers, on 03 November 2011 - 05:15 PM, said:

I'm going to say I want the exact opposite of this post.

I want the hit locations, armor, and hit points of the board game. Having 9 head armor, and armor maxes of 2x internal structure are only balanced in a random 2d6 roll, not being able to twitch fire your ERPPC at my head. Tactics as related to the existing battletech board game, NOT your skills at twitch in Call of Duty or the hyper-grognard World Of Tanks. Giant mechs are completely unrealistic in the first place. *** help you try to put realism in it!

Is this sarcasm? sorry, can't tell. I just don't see how targeting a mech and hoping the randomizer will maybe grant a headshot is going to cut it in today's gaming culture. There is no way PG would torpedo their own game by turning it into a 3D version of the board game. Not saying the board game is bad at all, loved it, had a very early version complete with a plastic Shadowhawk... but the board game combat rules simply won't translate into a first person fighting sim with enough mass appeal to keep the devs in Ramen.

Or maybe I don't understand your post? Clarify if I'm off the mark please. Thanks!

Edited by Angelicon, 04 November 2011 - 07:48 AM.

[wolf74]

Ok, This Post Covers a lot of other theards, a bulk of the problem you all are talking about is coved by the weapons convergence http://mwomercs.com/...on-convergence/
Most of the CBT Weapon Range are the Effective Range VS Bar 10 Armor also most of these there is a base for taking them out another 33.33% which is the extreme talked about earlier agian these is the "Effective Range" VS Bar 10 Armor.

Next the Basic targeting computer in the Battletech are very good if they didn't have Bad Data coming for counter targeting system. As your system trying to get a Good Range Using different sensor when it use one of them Firing a Range finding laser the Computer in the unit your targeting see the beam and Fire a beam back at you 2 or 3 time to give your system a over shot on the range. Same thing can be said for radar look how easily it is for today war planes and even boat these day to get around good Detection

The Active Probe, system would help with some of this but then you have the ECM to stop it from working.
Making you to have to Guess do I have my ECM in Jamming mode or Descrambler mode (AKA ECCM)

I don't have the New RPG book Yet, But in the Mechwarrior 3rd Edition FASA #1715 RPG book There are a few Infantry weapons that "Out Range" a ER PPC of 23hex(690m) or 30.6(920m)hexes at Extreme Range.

Basic Laser Rifle Range 1,100m(36.6hexes) VS Soft Target Like Infantry, but it only really effective at about 6hexes(180m) VS Hard Target like mechs

With the Above info as we can see the Yes the Weapon can Travel Much Farther but will just remove the paint off the armor is about it.

[Agent 0 Fortune]

This game is not Modern Warfare it is Mechwarrior. If you do not want to play a game based on giant robots, including all the arbitrary rules required to make that concept feasible. I will be very surprised and disappointed if every mech is hopping around on one leg. I also hope that you cannot fire a small laser or AC/20 as far as a PPC and players will need to identify their combat role.