5 replies to this topic

[p00k]

So, trial mechs are awful. The free player grind, as a result, is awful (founders and mc buyers, if you haven't already, try a totally free account and see). So awful that while I'm frustrated if my team has suicide farmers, I don't really blame them.

They have two things going for them.

• You can hop into an otherwise expensive mech immediately
  
• You don't have to pay to fix it afterwards.

They have four things against them.

• You don't get full cbills.
  
• You don't get any mech xp.
  
• You can't customize them.
  
• The stock configs are generally awful, largely due to inadequate heatsinks and ammo since weapons now fire faster than TT and armor values doubled.

I'd like to ditch those last two limitations though, and I think doing so would go a long way towards reducing suicide farming and making the new player grind much more enjoyable.


But wait, won't this make people not want to buy their own mechs? Well, a few caveats.

• You still have to pay for any items/weapons/initial ammo you add into it (still free repair/rearm), and you can't sell or transfer equipment from the stock variant.
  
• Since the trial mechs are rotated, remove the "upgrades" option for them - no DHS/ES/FF/artemis. This is a necessity, since once one rotation gets phased out, since those upgrades are mech-specific, players would lose them. Plus, another reason people will want their own mechs (and then it might be ok for DHS to be an outright upgrade!)
  
• When the rotation changes, any items/weapons you bought go back into your inventory, stuff you can sell back later, put on a different trial mech, or put on your personal mech when you can afford it
  
• You still don't get to choose which variants are available, maintaining the incentive to have your own stable of mechs. Similarly you don't get full cbills or mech xp.

This would maintain the two main goals of the trial system - a backup source of income and an introduction for new players, without making trials an exercise in anger management. Players with custom mechs would have a reason to occasionally play a trial mech to test drive a chassis/variant they don't already own. And there are still plenty of advantages to owning your own mech (and, for those lacking in time, still plenty of reason to buy MC and use it to buy your own mech).


In fact, I suspect people would be more willing to spend real cash if they knew what kind of enjoyment having their own mechs could be, rather than accepting on faith that it has to be better than the frustration of the current trial grind. Test drives for cars only help if they give people a taste of how nice owning the car can be, not how awful a car can be until you buy it and change everything that sucked.

[Minos Murdoc]

I've said this before or countless posts asking the same thing - Yes it needs a overhaul, but not a complete change.

Personally i would like to the following

• 1 variant of each mech (changed on a weekly bases) - I like to try a trail before buying a mech
  
• Trials SHOULD get GXP for each match. as this is the longest grind of xp (if you don't convert MXP)
  
• C-Bills, think this is fine, and before anyone moans - they dont have rearm or repair costs that purchased mechs do. Ok on a good game the trial will make 80% of what they could have earned, but on a bad game where your mech is destroyed a trial mech will have more money left than a purchased mech.

Also the trials gives a new pilot the chance to play with each mech and class while they work out what mech and class suits them.

[Shiney]

I think it needs changing and I want to see PGI make $$$ too, so perhaps 'give' a mech to players, but they have to earn the Cbills for it before they can get another mech, hence still a grind so they might just pay the MC cost but gives them a chance to see what it's all about.

[MustrumRidcully]

Well, there is this post:
http://mwomercs.com/...nd-trial-mechs/

Bryan Ekman said:

Posting a Coming Soon Thread.

Lots of cool stuff to talk about.

Rule changes for Trial Mechs, Achievements, smoother, more fun, first user experience. All coming to an MWO near you.


(Yes I'm sorry for teasing you... well, not really.. )

We don't know yet where it leads us to. Hopefully mechwarrior noob nirvana, but it's way too vague.

[Ashram]

There are fundamental things wrong with trial mechs and the game in general which results in the game not being played as it should.
1) Trial by fire in mech that no one would ever try to run if it were their own(because of heat issues), makes for one crappy welcome to a new player.
2) No voice support means you'll constantly be slaughtered by those organized percentage of players who use teamspeak. And at peak hours is almost every match.

So what is the player to do? Take your lumps? and pray you'll be match on the same side as a group that has teamspeak? Do you suicide farm? Afk farm?
Ok say you grinded your deaths, ahem I mean cbills. Got your own mech, tricked it out, now you should win right? Nope, you'll still be slaughtered constantly to people using voice chat. So what now? Grind for another mech, but wait it costs anywhere from 30k up to 100k to repair depending on what you run setup wise. Losing only grants you around 85k ish, if your lucky. So your new ride isn't making you much money, not as much as your trial mech did. Guess what? back to your trial mech....

Also trial mechs are broken in that your mech trees don't affect trial mechs. I'm 8/8 4/4 for the Jenner JR7-K. So that trial Jenner JR7-K should be zipping along at 124.7 speed right? Nope speed is still the dismal 113.4. Also you guys put xl engines in heavy mechs like the awesome and Atlas which should NOT have them, yet don't put them in the light mechs that should have them.

Anyways my 2 cents.

[HighTest]

I disagree. I think the trial mech system works pretty well, except maybe that I'd like to see more than 4 mechs at a time. Or at least have mechs where one is a brawler, one sniper, one LRM boat and 1 generalist or something. That way newbies can give different mechs and different loadouts a try to see what they like and/or can play well. (I do believe that most of the trial mechs end up being too general, so it's hard to work on play styles.)

As the mech variants are based on actual variants from MechWarrior lore, I see no reason to 'improve' them to make them easier to run. Besides, newbies need to learn that each mech has a role. No mech is good at everything. Sure, I can make a killer LRM boat or a merciless brawler, but I guarantee it won't be any good at the opposite. Players should learn that if their mech is loaded with lasers, by gosh it'll overhat. Or if they try to brawl with an LRM-loaed catapult, they will probably die.

Other thoughts:

- CBill rewards are fine. If you lose, you still manage to bank 60k. When I lose a match with one of my mechs, I lose 20k. I'd be happy with +60k, even if my upside potential from a win is lower. (As a PUG, I don't expect to win much anyway.)

- XP rewards are not a bad idea, but maybe reduce them to half or something. Experience IS experience, whether it's your mech or not. You could consider it to be like boot camp or training. Just make sure if it's an immediate disconnect or intentional overheating or if they never move that they don't get any reward for doing nothing.

- A trial mech is not your mech. So you don't get to customize it. When you borrow your friend's car, do you get to repaint it or pull the v6 in it for a 4-cylinder before you give it back? Uhh, no. Someone's just paying you to take their mech and do something for them, so you're getting your salary plus maybe a win bonus.

Once people get some idea of their play style of preferences, then they can buy their own mechs and add 10 MLASs or 4 LRM20s or 3 PPCs or whetever if they want to specialize in. Then they too get the honor and priviledge of losing 20k cbills whenever their creation get blown to bits on the battlefield.