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There have been allot of thing on my mind since this game has gone into open beta, and while the TT vs. VG rules has been one of them, one that really sticks out is 'Which was the worst property of MW/BT in its long history? Two big ones that come up when you talk to most people are either Mechassault or Battletech Heroclix.
Both of these are top contenders for things I'd really rather forget where things that ever existed, but when it comes to the worst, I full believe that MWO takes that cake. Now I know the lot of you at this point already stopped reading to either flame, or throw useless platitudes like "it's only beta..." or "if you don't like it then don't play it." Or some such, but that isn't what im driving at. As a survivor of the two worst properties, Ive come out the other side of tunnel with allot of different prospective. I'm not the type that wants franchises from my childhood to die in fire spiraling down to the ground in impressive explosions. (see tribes, and team fortress)
My favorite game in the property is MW4, and I have no illusions that the game was by any means perfect, same goes for the newest edition of Battletech. They do however give a great jumping off point to see where we are going wrong. So with the introduction out of the way let's get down to Brass tacts.
1)SRMS.
Yeah, this is a obvious choice for number one, but because of how remarkable bad the mechanics and the math coming out of the mechanics are. There has been allot of debate about how exactly to Nerf the worst offenders of balance but at the end of the day, I think the most simple fixes to the mechanics they already have.
A) Have streaks fire with SRMS spread. Pretty simple and yet no one ever brings this up, or at least not nearly enough . I think its the most over looked thing about streaks. Streaks are not a very popular item in the battle tech universe as the spread was rather unbearable. If you examine the history of both streams and SRMS, the only real difference between them is the target lock which as true fans are quick to point out to people who don't have that knowledge or experience, doesn't mean because they hit 100% of the time mean that they are any easier to hit with then having a SRM, but there will be more on that in target locks. Having predictive guidance may be one way to deal with this, but why not use mechanics already programmed into the game?
Bee)Damage decrease. I really don't know what is what the missile fetish programmers/developers have for missiles, but what they have now for missiles make's MW4's ****** for missiles look like he decided to have a naked run in the dead of winter in Alaska. This is really perplexing to me. If you look at the TT damage values compared to MWO damage values they are almost completely uniform till you get down to missiles. I ask; WHY? Well, i'll get more into that on my section on LRMS. For now, i'll just say they do not require any more skill to use, and are at no disadvantage that would warrant them having more damage then the TT and being on the same field as a ML choice.
C)[Lock on. Alot of ideas have been thrown around on how to do this, but at the end of the day I come back to the idea of improving on the mechanics that are already in place. Increasing lock on time to 2.5 seconds, and requiring the centre dot in the crosshair to be fully over the mech, and the moment that centre circle loses the mech even partially, they lose the lock. these two things will make using streaks more of a skill based affair. This would also fix the even more broken interaction between streaks and target decay, which makes an noob tube weapon even more noob tubier.
2. ECM. Something else that seems endless debate which to me seems to have the simplest solution in looking at the TT rules and using rules in game to fix it with out having to program even more things into the game which may or may not work and lead to more patches to fix. The biggest problem is the abuse of the tt rules, throwing all the ecm rules into a bucket and spiting out this crazy, broken, and terrible hybrid.
A)Replace no missile lock with a 1.5 second increase time. This would be of course, the correct translation from TT to VG.
Bee) Decease ECM Range. This one might not be as obvious to the other, however I don't think map size (Oh, you gunna get yours) was considered in converting ECM from TT to VG. Even if we do ever get decent size maps, ECM range should be nerfed if unlike the TT where any mech could put on a guardian ecm if it had the room, only a few privileged mech get it. It would be a nerf to balance the two aspects.
C)Keep how ECM work with the c3. Something they did right.
D)No bonus for BAG, NARC, and such. This is really the only thing ECM should nagate.
3) Lrms. I eluded to this earlier, but it seems like missiles in all forms have been the least balanced thing from TT to VG. Here's a look at why and how this can be fixed.
A)Have speed effect targeting of LRMS the same way ECM does. Yeah, this is a TT to VG solution, but its one that makes sense in all the right ways. People are quick to throw out false arguments like 'Hide behind cover when missiles are fired at you' but missiles still phase through solid objects still and that might get hammered out one day but still wouldn't fix the real problem or the even less informed 'Run away' which should work, and in this post I am advocating to work, as in TT, missiles don't out run or out maneuver a fast Jenner (A Gauss round at 12 hexes will have the same to hit number as LRMS.)
Bee)Damage down to 1/missile. I guess MW publishers all belong to the cult of the missile, where missiles are some sort of all knowing all destroying, malevolent deity and modeled them in game as such. This never made any sense to me as missiles have always been the easy way to win in the video games, where in battle tech its no easier to with with LRMS as a Gauss from distance. A the root of the problem is missiles having a massive damage advantage in the VG. In VG, LRMS can do well over 20 points of damage with only having 60-75% of the missiles actually hitting, and with the rest of the team doing all the real hard work getting targets for them, and ontop of that missiles have near perfect tracking.
C)Increase minimum range. This one also go against the table top rules and might seem like an odd fix for some one who people build up as their straw man 'make the video game exactly like the tabletop' however we (fa/tg/uys) are not looking to make the game exactly like the TT but rather look at the TT and see how we can use that to improve the current VG.) the reason for this entry is because of the rather odd interaction between movement and distances in the game. What the numbers should be for this I can't speak to at the moment but the 90 min range is far to close for LRMS. From the perspective of the jenner cockpit the 90m distance puts me nearly face to face to the missile boat in comparison, in the TT all LRMS have a min range of 6 which doesn't look close at all. Come to think of it, i'm pretty sure a hex is 30m in battle tech, so min range for lrms should 180 like in BT perhaps.
4) SRMS. This one is going to be short since ive said all I really need to say about missiles in the Streak and LRM sections and most of this is repeating the hits.
A)Damage decrease, spread increase. I don't know if SRMS will ever be balanced to the point where they are the clear choice for close range combat, as they are only slightly harder then streaks and do way more damage. But bring damage in line with the TT values as almost every other weapon is, and increasing the spread is a start. Maybe increasing the damage taken to missile points when the bay is open which would make it better as players will need to use the open/close feature to make sure they are not talking tons and tons of damage. Increasing the spread too will help spread the less damage over more parts meaning splat cats can 90 damage CT so easily, and it would give mechs going up against it more survive ability.
5) Maps. Oh man...This topic has been the bane of me since I started playing. Not only do they be much bigger, but scaling needs a big fix so a tiny little rock on the ground doesn't send me flying into the air like it was a ramp and me a bmx bike, or worse yet, when tiny little things on the ground or slight hills make me go from 150 KPH to a dead stop or rubberband/get stuck to terrain and become a sitting duck. Fix the net code,(Which is getting better) and fix the maps errors.
6) Match making. This is also something i talked about which recently started getting allot of heat. However, the solution they came up with is terrifying, and is going to lead to more people leaving then it is having a better experience. What people on the forums talk about and seems to fly over the heads of the devs is that the root of the match making problems is balanced teams. This MUST be fix number 1 that happens to match making before anything else. You can't put in a ranking system but allow one player to play bughouse chess and the other to only play by the normal rules of chess and expect ranking to fix the problem. What the Devs have tried so far has failed miserably for balanced match making and will continue to till they do the only thing that is ACTUALLY GOING TO FIX IT. If you have a tonnage limit or use something like RHOD used to balance teams you got to do something to make sure every one is playing by the same set of rules before you force a rank system on us.
7)Min damage for min range. pretty self explainatory. This started off well enough with ppc's but Gauss and Ac's need this too. The correct counter to ppcs and small caliber ACs is to get into their face and hit em. Them doing full damage at all ranges makes you an easy kill rather then making harder them to kill you.
So, for the TL;DR crowd: Devs are dumb and if they only listen to me we can have the perfect MW game blah blah blah.
Edited by CancR, 01 February 2013 - 05:29 PM.
