101 replies to this topic

[Kyone Akashi]

Kunae, on 31 January 2013 - 03:49 PM, said:

At least you can avoid knockdowns, with skilled piloting... vs streaks, no.

You cannot avoid knockdowns if you do not see them coming. No pilot can retain 360° awareness throughout the match, and from my experience, tacklers often like to slam into your side rather than coming directly from the front. Also, please let us not pretend that Lights can actually "turn on a dime", as is so often claimed on these forums, hai?

Not to mention that I do not actually like having to expect that any enemy could prefer to ram me just because it is so easy to do and they do not suffer any side-effects from pulling such a manoeuvre. This is not realistic, and I confess I would rather concentrate on a proper firefight.

As for ECM+Streaks - skilled piloting (and aiming) can actually defeat them. You still have your weapons, and you can move. You won't have a good chance, but at least you will almost always deal some damage to the enemy. Which is more than an inglorious end pinned to the ground whilst various ordnance slams into your immobile paper armor.

Edited by Kyone Akashi, 31 January 2013 - 03:57 PM.

[PANZERBUNNY]

Kyone Akashi, on 31 January 2013 - 03:38 PM, said:

Another video on how "fun" knockdowns can be when they become the prime method of attack even before shooting. This is not how it works within the setting, and this is not what should be the focus of the game.

Note how my sole contempt regarding such underhanded tactics is directed solely against the aforementioned "knockdown death squads" - I deem it realistic and an appropriate challenge that a collision between machines with a significant gap in size and weight should have the appropriate effects. But honestly: when playing this game, I am hoping for exciting firefights, not for some sort of football where BattleMechs pin each other to the ground, basically stunlocking their opponent so that the other pilot has zero chance to escape the kill. Might as well lean back as soon as you are tackled. The whole experience is rather frustrating, which is why I believe it was not a coincidence that the mechanic was removed just as tackling became more popular than shooting, regardless of the public explanation about the netcode warping (really, did that bother anyone? the victim was still dead meat, as you can clearly see on the video).

My own thoughts on how to re-implement a collision mechanic would focus on establishing a difference between the weight classes, simultaneously offering a more fair as well as more realistic approach to the general principle. For example, it could be possible to have knockdowns happen only upon collision with a heavier 'Mech, whereas colliding with a machine of similar or lower weight class merely results in a temporary loss of control, having the 'Mech stagger a few meters in an altered direction. Also, all 'Mechs involved in a collision should take an amount of damage.

Expanding on this idea, an option for an even deeper implementation could implement a chance for knockdowns that gets higher the more the other 'Mech weighs and the faster it moves. This could also be affected by modules such as an "Improved Gyro".

You do roll to determine whether or not your U/AC5 jams. You roll to determine which crit slot is hit when incurring damage beyond armor. You roll to determine whether or not your ammunition blows up. You roll to determine when your reactor blows from overheat.

There is no reason to avoid chance entirely, where it makes a better game element than not being there at all.
That being said, perhaps chance could also be replaced by requiring the pilot to react with his left/right steering keys, like a sort of "quick-reaction minigame" where you need to quickly regain balance otherwise you fall to the side?


Not really. Focus fire lets you react. Being tackled by, say, some fast-mover that slams into you from the side just as you were focusing on a different enemy means you can lean back and watch your 'Mech get ripped apart whilst not being able to do anything for several seconds. Talk about getting thrown out of the immersion!

Tackling only became so popular because it was the easiest way to get rid of Lights. Little armour, not moving, not shooting? Free kills! Joy all around. Except for anyone subjected to such a fate, of course.
If some people think ECM+Streaks is bad, they haven't seen dedicated tacklers in action.

And people don't factor in that when armour was doubled, the life expectancy of lights went well beyond what it should be. They are VERY fragile machines.

ECM lights can solo many mechs that outclass them in weapons without any worry at this moment in time.

Lights aren't meant to be weaving in and out of enemy formations as a "scout". Skilled light warriors can do it and do it well without getting knocked over, but they are few and far between.

Only those scrubs who don't have the chops to responsibly pilot their light rig have a problem with knockdowns.

What we have NOW is an excess of light pilots who are riding off of ECM and the previous lag shield, now complaining about the future of their "successful" play style.

[Kunae]

Kyone Akashi, on 31 January 2013 - 03:52 PM, said:

You cannot avoid knockdowns if you do not see them coming. No pilot can retain 360° awareness throughout the match, and from my experience, tacklers often like to slam into your side rather than coming directly from the front.

Not to mention that I do not actually like having to expect that any enemy could prefer to ram me just because it is so easy to do and they do not suffer any side-effects from pulling such a manoeuvre. This is not realistic, and I confess I would rather concentrate on a proper firefight.

As for ECM+Streaks - skilled piloting (and aiming) can actually defeat them. You still have your weapons, and you can move. You won't have a good chance, but at least you will almost always deal some damage to the enemy. Which is more than an inglorious end pinned to the ground whilst various ordnance slams into your immobile paper armor.

You're arguing in circles, a bit...

You can't defend against that 6-SRM6 Cat-A1 you didn't see, either.

Prior to this latest net-code improvement, whomever had the most streaks won, in any light-vs-light combat. Now, unless you're good, that still holds true. If one of the mechs, that have the same amount of streaks, also has ECM, well... game over for the one who lacks it.

[Rakashan]

What astonishes me most is that OP could look at this and ignore all the Ravens tripping over each other at the beginning of the first match and then complain about it being used against the opponent once to allow other lights to catch the fastest light on the map.

If you look at that video and actually think about what is going on, knockdown is doing *exactly* what it should be doing. The Ravens are falling all over each other unless they pilot carefully. Dashing through a host of enemy mechs is not trivial and results in death. (Trying to stand up for the COM pilot at 4:55 like what he was trying to do made sense? Really?) And then giving hugs to a zombie... You know, knockdown has nothing to do with that and in fact it knocked down the Ravens and *not* the AWS as you heard when one of the RVN drivers pointed out that he could not get up because he kept getting trampled.

So yeah, there is potential for abuse if your team catches a solo light, knocks it down and then walks all over it... Life is tough all over. I'm waiting for the day that the impulse from an AC/20 knocks them into next week the way it should. You think life sucks as a light pilot without the lag shield, just wait... Physics is *not* your friend. The only thing about Physics that is hurting you right now is bad "trip" mechanics hurting your legs... Physics should be much *worse* for you, not much better.

[PANZERBUNNY]

Running at 120KPH and getting hit by Dual Ac 20's seems to simply scratch the paint. Sometimes not even registering. OH the days, if they code it, when the lights get smacked and get knocked face first into the dirt from the impact.

[Sadistic Savior]

Use TT rules for Knockdown? I think those would work here.

[Kyone Akashi]

Kunae, on 31 January 2013 - 04:00 PM, said:

You can't defend against that 6-SRM6 Cat-A1 you didn't see, either.

That is true, but for some reason even that felt more honest to me, and (in my own subjective experience) it did not occur so often as encountering dedicated tacklers in the last few days before it was removed. Perhaps my opinion is simply colored by the frustration of being thrown out of what was an exciting match and then forced into inactivity as you slowly get to watch your components being blown off. That degrading feeling of helplessness.

PANZERBUNNY, on 31 January 2013 - 03:57 PM, said:

And people don't factor in that when armour was doubled, the life expectancy of lights went well beyond what it should be. They are VERY fragile machines.

People making such comments also forget to factor in that Lights have become less efficient as their weapons now take twice the time to chew through, say, the back armor of an Atlas they catched with its pants down.
I'd be quite willing to try out a week of MWO using normal armor values. Perhaps the result might surprise people?

PANZERBUNNY, on 31 January 2013 - 03:57 PM, said:

Lights aren't meant to be weaving in and out of enemy formations as a "scout". Skilled light warriors can do it and do it well without getting knocked over, but they are few and far between.

I am sorry, have you even read my post? I am quite in favor of re-introducing knockdown as a result of collisions with heavier 'Mechs. What I do not want to see return is Lights using collision as their primary weapon to disable other Lights. Which has nothing to do with enemy formations whatsoever. My last knockdown before removal occurred whilst I was capturing the enemy base, then got thrown down and picked apart by two returning Jenners who switched roles between keeping me "stunlocked" and chipping away at my structure.

Is it really that hard to understand that I would have favored a shoot-out?

PANZERBUNNY, on 31 January 2013 - 03:57 PM, said:

Only those scrubs who don't have the chops to responsibly pilot their light rig have a problem with knockdowns. What we have NOW is an excess of light pilots who are riding off of ECM and the previous lag shield, now complaining about the future of their "successful" play style.

I see you are quick with assumptions and insults. Do you have any advice on how to constantly retain 360° awareness and track of any and all fast-movers in the enemy team throughout the entire match, thus safely avoiding being tackled, whilst still being able to actually assist and work with your team?

[CrashieJ]

I liked Knockdowns, it shows who can really pilot a light mech and who's just poured in a 35 ton tin-can

[BeerSteiner]

Yes, physics can be a *****. Please adapt and overcome or go away. Knocking down mechs is a usefull and valid tactic.

[Mackman]

Kyone Akashi, on 31 January 2013 - 03:38 PM, said:

You do roll to determine whether or not your U/AC5 jams. You roll to determine which crit slot is hit when incurring damage beyond armor. You roll to determine whether or not your ammunition blows up. You roll to determine when your reactor blows from overheat.

There is no reason to avoid chance entirely, where it makes a better game element than not being there at all.
That being said, perhaps chance could also be replaced by requiring the pilot to react with his left/right steering keys, like a sort of "quick-reaction minigame" where you need to quickly regain balance otherwise you fall to the side?

Pretty sure they're changing the UAC-5 jamming mechanic. I agree that RNG for "small" events can work, even possibly be better than not doing it at all. But RNG for "big" events is ridiculous and frustrating.

Having RNG for ammo explosions is fine, since most of the time you're firing several weapons, making each individual hit more of a "small" event. But physically slamming your mech into someone is a much larger event than shooting them, and making something that large dependent on chance will only cause widespread rage in all but the most hard-core TT players.

I would love a skill-based mechanic like the one you suggested. It makes sense, provides a possible counter, and is entirely dependent on player skill, situational awareness, reaction time, etc (although there would probably need to be some way to "guarantee" a knock-down, or else it would never succeed against good players). Given the opportunity for a skill-based mechanic, I really don't see why anyone would want an RNG mechanic instead...

[TVMA Doc]

Kyone Akashi, on 31 January 2013 - 03:52 PM, said:

You cannot avoid knockdowns if you do not see them coming. No pilot can retain 360° awareness throughout the match, and from my experience, tacklers often like to slam into your side rather than coming directly from the front. Also, please let us not pretend that Lights can actually "turn on a dime", as is so often claimed on these forums, hai?

Not to mention that I do not actually like having to expect that any enemy could prefer to ram me just because it is so easy to do and they do not suffer any side-effects from pulling such a manoeuvre. This is not realistic, and I confess I would rather concentrate on a proper firefight.

As for ECM+Streaks - skilled piloting (and aiming) can actually defeat them. You still have your weapons, and you can move. You won't have a good chance, but at least you will almost always deal some damage to the enemy. Which is more than an inglorious end pinned to the ground whilst various ordnance slams into your immobile paper armor.

I'd agree with you on this. I'd also suggest that knockdown should cause damage to mechs, especially a lighter mech slamming into a heavier mech. If you bounce a Prius off a Hummer, you may stop both vehicles, but one is going to suffer more.

Knockdown also needs to be coded carefully. I played Star Wars Galaxies and it had many iterations of the knockdown wars/snare wars that seriously hurt the game's viability. As this poster mentioned, it may be irritating to get pummeled by a light with wave after wave of SSRMs, but it will be absolutely infuriating to get knocked down repeatedly until dead, without ever having had a chance to counter.

[Bluescuba]

Particle Man, on 31 January 2013 - 02:16 PM, said:

I think what we have now in place of knockdowns, infinite rubber banding that you dont notice for a few seconds that is hard to get out of, is far worse than the actual knockdowns were.

bring back knockdowns, even as they were, and get rid of this stupid rubberbanding if you get near another mech. At least knockdowns make sense to a human brain and physics and stuff.

What he said!

+1

[TVMA Doc]

Kyone Akashi, on 31 January 2013 - 04:17 PM, said:

That is true, but for some reason even that felt more honest to me, and (in my own subjective experience) it did not occur so often as encountering dedicated tacklers in the last few days before it was removed. Perhaps my opinion is simply colored by the frustration of being thrown out of what was an exciting match and then forced into inactivity as you slowly get to watch your components being blown off. That degrading feeling of helplessness.

People making such comments also forget to factor in that Lights have become less efficient as their weapons now take twice the time to chew through, say, the back armor of an Atlas they catched with its pants down.
I'd be quite willing to try out a week of MWO using normal armor values. Perhaps the result might surprise people?

I am sorry, have you even read my post? I am quite in favor of re-introducing knockdown as a result of collisions with heavier 'Mechs. What I do not want to see return is Lights using collision as their primary weapon to disable other Lights. Which has nothing to do with enemy formations whatsoever. My last knockdown before removal occurred whilst I was capturing the enemy base, then got thrown down and picked apart by two returning Jenners who switched roles between keeping me "stunlocked" and chipping away at my structure.

Is it really that hard to understand that I would have favored a shoot-out?

I see you are quick with assumptions and insults. Do you have any advice on how to constantly retain 360° awareness and track of any and all fast-movers in the enemy team throughout the entire match, thus safely avoiding being tackled, whilst still being able to actually assist and work with your team?

This is what I mention about a tactic being overused to the point of hurting the game. They should bring back knockdown, but institute damage-perhaps even chances at critical damage to systems-when doing so. You CAN ram one submarine with another, but doing so might just cause you as much damage as your opponent.

The two Jenners in this case should have been crippling themselves while trying to play WWF.

[Kyone Akashi]

Mackman, on 31 January 2013 - 04:29 PM, said:

I would love a skill-based mechanic like the one you suggested. It makes sense, provides a possible counter, and is entirely dependent on player skill, situational awareness, reaction time, etc (although there would probably need to be some way to "guarantee" a knock-down, or else it would never succeed against good players).

Hmmh, perhaps the kinetic energy of the collision (weight + speed) could be used to generate a sort of difficulty level, which in turn decides how fast the 'Mech would tilt to the side, so that heavier collisions require a quicker reaction?

As for the guarantee against good players, I suppose that would be the drawback of this level of realism and a skill-based mechanic over a chance-based one. Unless of course that was referring to a "difficulty level" so high that it simply would not be possible to counterbalance. Essentially the difference between the BattleMech merely tumbling a few meters, and it being literally "knocked off its feet".

[Mackman]

Kyone Akashi, on 31 January 2013 - 04:39 PM, said:

Hmmh, perhaps the kinetic energy of the collision (weight + speed) could be used to generate a sort of difficulty level, which in turn decides how fast the 'Mech would tilt to the side, so that heavier collisions require a quicker reaction?

As for the guarantee against good players, I suppose that would be the drawback of this level of realism and a skill-based mechanic over a chance-based one. Unless of course that was referring to a "difficulty level" so high that it simply would not be possible to counterbalance. Essentially the difference between the BattleMech merely tumbling a few meters, and it being literally "knocked off its feet".

Exactly, and your "difficulty level" formula would be perfect. Say, a dragon running full-tilt into a stationary Raven shouldn't really be counterable, you know? The Raven pilot shouldn't be able to just press a couple keys and miraculously withstand that much force without so much as staggering.

Edited by Mackman, 31 January 2013 - 04:49 PM.

[Alexii]

Can we plz plz plz get this back in game? Just that 1 feature back and I'll have a stomach for month minimum of grinding on premium and buying ur overpriced hero mechs. As it is right now - way to stale ;(

[Grits N Gravy]

Besides server synchronicity issues with object paths and location after a collision, the system itself was primitive at best. The problem was with how the rigid bodies were set up in the engine and the lack of a in depth collision system. Each mech was a rigid body, when you intersected it's boundary box a collision was detected. The boundary boxes were simply large rectangles surrounding the model. Once a collision was detected the system compared the mass of the objects, if one object had a greater mass than the other, the lighter object fell. Mass increases with speed thus making it possible for a lighter faster moving object knock over a heavier one. There was little spring effect, object deformation, rotational force, ect. Resulting in very static collisons which weren't very realistic or fun. In order to have better collisions you need more in depth modeling and All that stuff takes tons of plain old trial and error to get it right, because your trying to capture a feel.

The hummer vs prius example someone mentioned before is a perfect example. The hummer impales the Prius because not only is it more massive, it's also stiffer, made of denser steel alloys. The Prius also as structural weak points engineered into it's frame via crumple points. In order to have the chassis absorb most of the energy from a collision and not driver. Plugging simply the mass, force and acceleration values of the Prius and hummer into our engine and we would end up simulating a collision very similar to what we had before in MWO. To get a collisions which feels more like the real world one has do lots of tinkering with values and collision models on a mech to capture the feel properly. All of which takes lots of man hours, I honestly don't think it's a high priority at this point, due to it not being a revenue generating feature, ie new mechs, and the many hours it would take to get right. Who ever said it will probably be back around community warfare is probably right.

[Jon McAdder]

This might be absurd, but if they learnt from World of Tanks they can figure out how to implement crash damages and stuff (yes, I do play World of Tanks before this)

[Grits N Gravy]

Jon McAdder, on 31 January 2013 - 05:13 PM, said:

This might be absurd, but if they learnt from World of Tanks they can figure out how to implement crash damages and stuff (yes, I do play World of Tanks before this)

It took them almost a year to implement it after they launched, at which point they had more resources than MWO does. And that system is still relatively simple, no object deformation, Mass force calculations to determine hit point loss, ect. Could something like that work for MWO sure, but it would have to be even more complicated than WOT's to deal with the variable hit point locations. A mech needs more boundery boxes than a tank, because each part, arm's legs, ect have serprate HP values.

[BigJim]

Mazzyplz, on 31 January 2013 - 01:49 PM, said:

[i don't want to call attention to anyone in particular but if you're so proud of this as to post it i shall repost it as well]

I'm embarrassed by, and for you - Can you not tell that this is a pre-arranged video session?

That's a comedy vid, pure & simple - The guy who makes them gets all 16x players in the same channel, decks out the mechs accordingly, and films the footage before editing it into whatever form is required.

It's as creative a thing as one can possibly achieve given the limited tools we have to work with (no true Demo-Rec, etc..), whereas you, my belligerent wee chum have gone out of your way to denigrate others and cause strife.

Now I know by the way you posted this that you have far too little capacity for self-moderation to even begin to feel ashamed by what you have done, but for a normal, balanced person, that would be the normal response about now.