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kamikaziechameleon
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Fri Sep 20, 2013 3:19 pm

They have initiated some really good ideas though. Their ask the developer features are really good. End of the day though they are cherry picking information, recommendation and questions to a large extent. They don't produce transparent metrics to back up some of their claims, and they really just struggle with some fundamental concepts.

Foundation-ally seems they have hit box issues in the game that are from the beginning and I can't believe by developer admition they would let them persist for 2 years plus of development. Then because of that they only have pinpoint accuracy for the weapons systems to simplify things, that has created cascading issues such as one hit kill alpha strikes, etc. that have made them do all sorts of annoying and wierd things to compensate for that issue. They changed armor, then ghost heat, w/o addressing the fact that with the armor bumps that heat was already gimping energy weapons. Seems they are severely convoluting things to avoid resolving a major issue.

End of day though there are lots of people enjoying the game as long as they don't focus on the future, balance, design, and execution.

Given how much content is constantly rolling out I really hope they can resolve some of these less lucrative problems and hammer out some semblance of balance and nuance to the game.
 
NovusBogus
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Fri Sep 20, 2013 10:11 pm

I don't think PGI is evil or stupid per se, they're just didn't have any experience making anything other than casual games until MWO so they don't quite know what they're supposed to be doing. I played a lot in closed/open beta but lost interest about six months ago, just not enough replay value to keep me interested. Unless they've horribly borked it their freemium program works fairly well, all the win-button builds can be put together with the ~8 million credits you get from the newbie bonus reward.

My take on it (again, outdated by six months or so but probably not that different) is if you liked multiplayer MW4 but thought it suffered from a lack of boom headshots or liked TF2 and thought it wasn't quite strategic enough you'll like MWO, otherwise you will get frustrated quickly. But it's free so you might as well at least give it a shot.
 
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Fri Sep 20, 2013 10:41 pm

kamikaziechameleon wrote:
Hate seems like a strong word, only in that its such an active thing. Like you spend time each day meditating on the games faults or something. I get that its not a good battle tech game, its a decent though strangely not balanced hawken clone.

I wish it was more but don't want to spend my energy getting all bent out of shape about what it isn't.
You're absolutely right that it's a strong word. Though I didn't mention it in my first post, I too grew up with Battletech, among other games. My older brother was my idol growing up, and he and his friends spent hours playing Battletech on sprawling paper hex-maps. I didn't really understand the game, as young as I was, but I remember thoroughly enjoying thumbing through the Technical Readouts and admiring the mech designs. (´・ω・`)

Other people have already said more or less what I'm going to say, but adapting the paper-and-dice Battletech rules into a video game -- unless it is a turn-based strategy game like MegaMek -- is just never going to work and feel like Battletech. The weapons just don't make sense (why does a 20mm cannon have quadruple the range of a 200mm cannon, why do PPCs have a ~50 meter minimum range, why are the "missiles" largely unguided, why would anyone manufacture a giant walking robot that's as clumsy as Battlemechs are, etc.) Hawken and Armored Core both do a better job with the whole giant mech thing, even if Hawken is a shameless cash grab with uninteresting mech designs, almost no customization, and terrible weapon variety. At least it's pretty. (・∀・)
 
Kurkotain
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Fri Sep 20, 2013 11:27 pm

kamikaziechameleon wrote:
SoM wrote:
i'm a MW fan, tried MWO and had my ass handed to me, just like in World of Tanks, where everyone had better stuff that i couldn't compete with.

uninstalled

i'm waiting on Homeworld Shipbreakers, signed for beta but not picked yet :(


I'm fine with loosing in a high skill game. I played starcraft 2 online and lost for days straight, didn't stop me from playing, didn't make it a bad game. I don't play competitive games hoping I'll win, expecting I'll win, being angry if I'm not as good as someone who's played a year. Took me 2 years in counter strike to have a positive kill/death ratio. Such is the nature of competitive format. I don't know how you do anything if not being awesome stops you from doing it.

I was ok with the idea of fremium for this game. I had set aside mentally about 100 dollars to start in MWO to get the mechs I wanted setup ASAP. Get some friends in and get a lance rolling. Selling coolant flushes is a F'Ing Crime IMHO. That was a larger red flag for me that PGI had no idea what they were doing than anything. Its akin to selling double damage boosts in any other game.

I believe at any point things for MWO could turn around but the issue is that PGI seems to have no idea what they are really doing up there. They are creating a game that doesn't really appeal to existing core fans, who is going to promote their game if not the fans?

I'm really sorry Kurkotain, looks like I asked a loaded question yesterday.


It's ok, everyone has their opinons about things, and certainly not everyone is having as much fun or in the same place as i am in the game (im not saying im good, just that i just have a year playing it, therefore i have accumulated lots of battlemechs, their upgrades which are essential for non-soul crushing gameplay and experience in the different chassis)

About the coolant flush, i think that got blown out of proportion. Yes, you can buy coolant flush 18 for MC, but it is only necessary for competitive play, and more importantly. The module progression ladder offers something called coolshot 9 by 9, which automatically transforms the coolshot 9 (the normal cbill variant) into a coolshot 18 (the real money variant) and can be bought with GXP (in game general experience) which is a pain to grind, and yes, you can accelerate the process with MC (you can transform accumulated mech XP into GXP using MC, since the GXP grind rate is around 5-10% of normal XP per match), but if you are going to use it competetively you are anyway spending the time into farming it.

My point is, there are worse things to be against in the game. Hero mechs are one of those. there are hero variants that are certainly better than the normal variants of each chassis (ILYA MUROMETS comes to mind) but even the best hero mech wont make up for your deficiencies as a pilot, and there are equivalent builds with normal variants that almost come close to the hero one (MISERY being the only exception, its the only STK with a ballistic hardpoint, but in my opinion its not a big problem since STKs are not meant to be close range mechs, and a gauss rifle is a liability in a mech with such a tendency to get its side torsos blown off)

The artillery and airstrikes are a joke and almost nobody uses them, and besides, they have the same balancing mecanism as the coolshot: a permanent module (does not occupy space) can be bought for 5000 GXP that will bring you up to the level of the MC variant.

I'm not an old mechwarrior, and even worse an old battletech player. MWO was my first experience with Battletech, and i loved learning and reading up on the lore of battletech, the different factions and the history behind the inner sphere and clans. not that it's required to play MWO buy it certainly helps when you simply can't find an appropriate role in a certain battlemech.

I'll continue this post later. wait.
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Forge
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Sun Sep 22, 2013 2:04 pm

I've been an old clanner since MW2, and I don't see anything of redeeming value in MWO. I'm sorry, but it's true. It's a generic mech-like shooter, the hitboxes in particular are way off, and they keep doing non-MW things to work around problems with their game.
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kamikaziechameleon
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Mon Sep 23, 2013 3:40 pm

Forge wrote:
I've been an old clanner since MW2, and I don't see anything of redeeming value in MWO. I'm sorry, but it's true. It's a generic mech-like shooter, the hitboxes in particular are way off, and they keep doing non-MW things to work around problems with their game.


I have kept reading and asking around about it and seems to be a solid point. They have sorta diverged in fundamental ways from the established balance and mechanics of the universe. In an effort to resolve a few simple design issues they have been digging ever further down the divergent design hole.

Having an issue with Alpha's and Boating doesn't sound like an armor problem or even a damage problem but a issue of heat management and weapon accuracy/hit box issue in game.

They resolved by doubling armor, then by ghost heat, and a dozen other things. Creating as many issues as they solve by not addressing weapon accuracy, hit box detection and heat management early on. Now to go back to the beginning and try and start over with balance would simply not work. So they have to fundamentally goof each and every aspect of the game up. IMHO, doing it right the first time would have served them much better than what we are dealing with right now.

That being said it still to a large extent looks like a blast. I hope to get some time with it, but my expectations and financial investment will be tapered by the rather goofy logic they've been using thus far for making the game.
 
druidcent
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Mon Sep 23, 2013 3:52 pm

I'm with all the old school BT crowd on this :P I was really hoping for a good Mechwarrior game that was true to the universe. Granted, that the original table top game had issues in terms of believability (PPC's with a min range, ER-PPCs which don't). When I was playing it (almost a year ago, when Nvidia hosted the MW:O tournament), I like the control aspects, and the game had potential...

As it kept going, it became less fun for me... turning into an FPS mech shooter, as Forge said. When the history thing seemed to not be moving (1:1 time scale meant that nothing significant was going to happen over the life of the game unless it lasted 20+ years)

The thing about BattleTech is that it should be about strategy and positioning. The tabletop game definitely had issues with certain mechs and weapons being more favorable.. but that was part of the strategy.. It got better when they introduced battle values for units (and per component to calculate for custom mechs)... that match ups would be more even. I'm not sure how you can translate that to Mech FPS shooters...

If they did design a true MW game, based on tabletop rules, it would be so far out of the FPS box, that all the competitive players would scream bloody murder, because they can't understand why their CoD tactics don't work...
 
Forge
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Mon Sep 23, 2013 4:52 pm

MW3 had similar problems, due to the simplicity of the game any slot could take any weapon, and it led to bizarre designs. I personally used to roll in a TimberWolf (MadCat) that had something absurd like 5 Gausses or 10 ultraACs, and used to one shot legs off of other mechs. Nobody ever played MW3 multiplayer with me twice. :(

Microsoft, being smarter than the MW:O owner/operators, gave up, rebuilt the engine with proper slot restrictions and limits, added on a decent SP campaign, and released it as MW4. I personally felt MW4 was pretty close to perfect, as video game translations of tabletop games go.
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shaq_mobile
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Mon Sep 23, 2013 6:18 pm

Since i was the original, upset, individual that started this thread I figured it was only proper to mention I just recently got back into it because some of my friends play it. A lot of issues with the game make me hesitant to spend any money on it.

Mech lab is sloppy, hard to know exactly what you're buying etc. It'd be nice to be able to loadout a mech before you buy. The UI in general is just poorly laid out.

Dying seems somewhat random sometimes. I'll be at 86% health then I'll die instantly with only one mech on the screen and all my chest armor gone. To me, one of the most important game factors is the art of surprise. The difference between leaving me angry and confused vs surprised and thoughtful is often based on how much information the game gives me. It's like death cams. When I can see how they did it, I'm much more relieved, even if it's largely luck.

Strict building limitations. Between tonnage, heat, slots, damage and range I feel like the stats weighting results in a more limited build setup. Which is sad because I always felt that was part of the beauty. Coming up with silly builds. :)

It's still fun but I don't think I'll spend any real money on it.
 
JustAnEngineer
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Mon Sep 23, 2013 6:19 pm

Microsoft also gave us MechCommander 2, where they decided that managing heat was too complicated, so they changed the mech designs so that each one could dissipate all of the heat of the default weapon set and jump jets. That makes a typically overheating mech chassis like the Starslayer or Zeus incredibly efficient.

shaq_mobile wrote:
I always felt that was part of the beauty. Coming up with silly builds. :)
I remember vividly when I was playing Ghost Bear Legacy that I settled on making customized builds that worked for my playing style. There wasn't any point in having extra-long range weapons, since I usually couldn't get a hit on anything over medium range. There also wasn't much point in having a lot of rear or side armor, since I was mostly charging straight at my opponents. I ended up with a lot of designs with max frontal armor and a whole load of medium pulse lasers.
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kamikaziechameleon
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Tue Sep 24, 2013 9:21 am

Forge wrote:
MW3 had similar problems, due to the simplicity of the game any slot could take any weapon, and it led to bizarre designs. I personally used to roll in a TimberWolf (MadCat) that had something absurd like 5 Gausses or 10 ultraACs, and used to one shot legs off of other mechs. Nobody ever played MW3 multiplayer with me twice. :(

Microsoft, being smarter than the MW:O owner/operators, gave up, rebuilt the engine with proper slot restrictions and limits, added on a decent SP campaign, and released it as MW4. I personally felt MW4 was pretty close to perfect, as video game translations of tabletop games go.


You have the tabletop game and the books. The books support the hardpoint restrictions they used in MW4 to an extent. There is a point where you try to support the universe or the game. I think load out restrictions are favorable to some of the broken mechanics at work now with ghost heat, double armor, poor heat management hit box issues, weapon pin point accuracy etc.
 
kamikaziechameleon
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Tue Sep 24, 2013 9:46 am

IMHO, Mech Commander 1 was the best mech game. I had the gold edition with the mission editor and the extra mechs like the turkina. IT was awesome.
 
druidcent
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Tue Sep 24, 2013 11:04 am

Forge wrote:
MW3 had similar problems, due to the simplicity of the game any slot could take any weapon, and it led to bizarre designs. I personally used to roll in a TimberWolf (MadCat) that had something absurd like 5 Gausses or 10 ultraACs, and used to one shot legs off of other mechs. Nobody ever played MW3 multiplayer with me twice. :(


It's been a while since I've designed a mech under the table top rules, but, from what I recall, you could at most put 4 Gauss Rifles on a mech, but you wouldn't have enough ammo for more than 4 turns.. Also 4 gauss rifles may end up too heavy.. The Stone Rhino is the only canon mech that I know which carried 3 Gauss rifles, and it was a 100t very slow Clan mech. I'm not 100% sure why this can't be translated well. I think the other issue would be assigning a Battle Value of some sort. Both sides should of the match should have an equivalent mech battle value, then it will be up to the players/pilots. It'll still be a little less strategy and a little more twitch, but that should be reasonable. It would be better than matching up certain number of assaults/heavy/med/lights...
 
kamikaziechameleon
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Tue Sep 24, 2013 1:17 pm

First review is up:
video review:
http://www.gametrailers.com/reviews/x21 ... ine-review
Written Review:
http://www.gametrailers.com/reviews/ap4 ... ine-review

Seems they might have "launched" prematurely as many core features are absent, tutorials, balance, game modes... The game sounds fun but not in a launch caliber, not like some other F2P games where.
 
NovusBogus
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Tue Sep 24, 2013 11:58 pm

A first-person Mechwarrior game is stuck in a nasty catch 22: as long as weapons shoot straight the game will be a horribly unbalanced core war but players will get frustrated if their shots don't hit. If it was up to me I'd bite the AC20 round and have any hit on an opponent then get run through a probability-based function to determine where the shot landed but I've always enjoyed making and managing loadouts and loot more than actually using them.

If nothing else, MWO will hopefully demonstrate that there really is demand for MW games. PGI has often said that they wanted to do a real successor to MW4 but nobody would fund anything but a freemium multiplayer arena. Then they got one of the largest stacks of crowdfund cash to date.
 
kamikaziechameleon
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Wed Sep 25, 2013 8:47 am

NovusBogus wrote:
A first-person Mechwarrior game is stuck in a nasty catch 22: as long as weapons shoot straight the game will be a horribly unbalanced core war but players will get frustrated if their shots don't hit. If it was up to me I'd bite the AC20 round and have any hit on an opponent then get run through a probability-based function to determine where the shot landed but I've always enjoyed making and managing loadouts and loot more than actually using them.

If nothing else, MWO will hopefully demonstrate that there really is demand for MW games. PGI has often said that they wanted to do a real successor to MW4 but nobody would fund anything but a freemium multiplayer arena. Then they got one of the largest stacks of crowdfund cash to date.


I don't think its actually an issue. Games with variable accuracy are many. COD has variable accuracy and recoil, why can't they put separate weapon accuracy in the game. People would learn to deal with it if they implemented it well. Right now its rather ridiculous how it works.

The hit boxes are another can of worms that have not worked properly since day one.

The missles and balistics are so off its not funny.

They will have to find some annoying ways to resolve these issues unless they want to build from the ground up.
 
kamikaziechameleon
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Wed Sep 25, 2013 12:36 pm

I'm annoyed that I keep getting down on this game. I want to love it. I need to just let it be and wait for it to stabilize a little bit.
 
shaq_mobile
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Wed Sep 25, 2013 2:07 pm

I'd like to see more depth in the damage of weapons (multiple damage types) and armor layouts. It'd also be cool to have a little more random accuracy on some of the weapons. Ballistic weapons should be a little more random. Something like the way WoT does it, but with less random distribution. That's soooo random it's enraging sometimes. I'd like to see all f2p games have models like LoL where you only pay for boosts and cosmetics. Buying items that make you inherently superior pretty much instantly makes me want to never give a dev money.

All that being said, MWO is free so it's at least worth picking up to play a few times. :)

I still feel like Living Legends played better.
 
kamikaziechameleon
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Tue Oct 01, 2013 9:43 am

shaq_mobile wrote:
I'd like to see more depth in the damage of weapons (multiple damage types) and armor layouts. It'd also be cool to have a little more random accuracy on some of the weapons. Ballistic weapons should be a little more random. Something like the way WoT does it, but with less random distribution. That's soooo random it's enraging sometimes. I'd like to see all f2p games have models like LoL where you only pay for boosts and cosmetics. Buying items that make you inherently superior pretty much instantly makes me want to never give a dev money.

All that being said, MWO is free so it's at least worth picking up to play a few times. :)

I still feel like Living Legends played better.


When a F2P game will run you over a 100 dollars to get at its content in a single shot I'm not interested. The price of MWO is rather obscene honestly. And they are so heavily price gating content that is so powerful its insane. GAAAAAAA.
 
Scrotos
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Thu Oct 03, 2013 10:49 am

druidcent wrote:
Forge wrote:
MW3 had similar problems, due to the simplicity of the game any slot could take any weapon, and it led to bizarre designs. I personally used to roll in a TimberWolf (MadCat) that had something absurd like 5 Gausses or 10 ultraACs, and used to one shot legs off of other mechs. Nobody ever played MW3 multiplayer with me twice. :(


It's been a while since I've designed a mech under the table top rules, but, from what I recall, you could at most put 4 Gauss Rifles on a mech, but you wouldn't have enough ammo for more than 4 turns.. Also 4 gauss rifles may end up too heavy.. The Stone Rhino is the only canon mech that I know which carried 3 Gauss rifles, and it was a 100t very slow Clan mech. I'm not 100% sure why this can't be translated well. I think the other issue would be assigning a Battle Value of some sort. Both sides should of the match should have an equivalent mech battle value, then it will be up to the players/pilots. It'll still be a little less strategy and a little more twitch, but that should be reasonable. It would be better than matching up certain number of assaults/heavy/med/lights...


Before any of the star league or clan stuff, I made a 100 tonner with 4 x AC/20. If you followed the example in the technical readout 3025 of the Victor which substituted 2 of the 4 arm myomers/actuators to have an AC/20 on the arm, you could do the same. My memory is hazy because I've had my books in storage for literally 15 years, but you'd have one AC/20 per arm (hands and forearms replaced) and one AC/20 per side of torso. Stuff any extra ammo in the legs and anywhere. It wasn't designed for anything but a quick takedown at close range, kinda like an UrbanMech.

My memory isn't exact on that as I'd have to dig up the sheets, but I might have made it or updated it with a star league tech XL fusion engine which would have made it very tight on ammo. And given that tech base, most likely UltraAC/20's for even more punch and even less staying power, ammo-wise. I dunno what the Battle Value stuff is. I kinda lost interest after I found out that Liao somehow became in charge of the star league. That reminds me, I need to try to beat BattleTech 2: Crescent Hawk's Revenge someday. Got hurt bad when fighting the clanners.
 
druidcent
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Thu Oct 03, 2013 8:19 pm

Scrotos wrote:
druidcent wrote:
Forge wrote:
MW3 had similar problems, due to the simplicity of the game any slot could take any weapon, and it led to bizarre designs. I personally used to roll in a TimberWolf (MadCat) that had something absurd like 5 Gausses or 10 ultraACs, and used to one shot legs off of other mechs. Nobody ever played MW3 multiplayer with me twice. :(


It's been a while since I've designed a mech under the table top rules, but, from what I recall, you could at most put 4 Gauss Rifles on a mech, but you wouldn't have enough ammo for more than 4 turns.. Also 4 gauss rifles may end up too heavy.. The Stone Rhino is the only canon mech that I know which carried 3 Gauss rifles, and it was a 100t very slow Clan mech. I'm not 100% sure why this can't be translated well. I think the other issue would be assigning a Battle Value of some sort. Both sides should of the match should have an equivalent mech battle value, then it will be up to the players/pilots. It'll still be a little less strategy and a little more twitch, but that should be reasonable. It would be better than matching up certain number of assaults/heavy/med/lights...


Before any of the star league or clan stuff, I made a 100 tonner with 4 x AC/20. If you followed the example in the technical readout 3025 of the Victor which substituted 2 of the 4 arm myomers/actuators to have an AC/20 on the arm, you could do the same. My memory is hazy because I've had my books in storage for literally 15 years, but you'd have one AC/20 per arm (hands and forearms replaced) and one AC/20 per side of torso. Stuff any extra ammo in the legs and anywhere. It wasn't designed for anything but a quick takedown at close range, kinda like an UrbanMech.

My memory isn't exact on that as I'd have to dig up the sheets, but I might have made it or updated it with a star league tech XL fusion engine which would have made it very tight on ammo. And given that tech base, most likely UltraAC/20's for even more punch and even less staying power, ammo-wise. I dunno what the Battle Value stuff is. I kinda lost interest after I found out that Liao somehow became in charge of the star league. That reminds me, I need to try to beat BattleTech 2: Crescent Hawk's Revenge someday. Got hurt bad when fighting the clanners.


I think that would be right.. I haven't built a mech in years :) The problem is the range and speed if I remember right.. you couldn't get any faster than 3/5, and the range was 6 hexes.. You'd have to go light on armor tons as well, meaning that you get chewed up before getting in range.. Definitely a good ambush mech :) I think you didn't have enough space (crit slots) if you used an XL engine, but again, I can't remember.

The Battle Value was used later to quantify the effectiveness of the mech. I think it came out with the 3055 or 3058 TRO. I remember before that battles were supposedly even based on total tons of opposing mechs. I can't remember when Liao took over the Inner Sphere, but I think that was just at the end of the story-arc before it went off the rails and became Clicky-tech... Also, I don't think it was the insane grandfather (Maximillian?) I think his grandson actually took over and was reasonably sane.. He ended up the equivalent of the Secretary General of the UN from what I remember. Victor still ended up controlling the armies.
 
Hawkwing74
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Fri Oct 04, 2013 8:45 am

druidcent wrote:
I can't remember when Liao took over the Inner Sphere, but I think that was just at the end of the story-arc before it went off the rails and became Clicky-tech... Also, I don't think it was the insane grandfather (Maximillian?) I think his grandson actually took over and was reasonably sane.. He ended up the equivalent of the Secretary General of the UN from what I remember. Victor still ended up controlling the armies.

I loved the old books, esp. the ones by Michael Stackpole. Then, they took the universe 100 years into the future with sort of a reset. That sucked. It wrecked all the existing continutity.

One question relevant to the game...is it all pvp? I don't think I would enjoy getting stomped by people who have been playing a long time while I get my feet wet.
 
Scrotos
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Fri Oct 04, 2013 9:37 am

@druidcent

Or maybe there was a 3063 or something? I think 3055 or 3058 was the last one I got. And yeah, it was Sun-Tzu (?).

@Hawkwing74

Yeah, ever notice how Stackpole's initials were the same as Melissa A. Steiner's? I always wondered about that. I didn't know about the 100 year bit, I got to the clan invasion and I liked some of the novels there along with the history stuff, but after the truce I fell outta interest.

My main love of the world is the world they created. The technical readouts with notable action and history of the 'mechs, the source books for the various houses, the rich history. Playing the tabletop game was kinda meh when I finally got around to it. And I never got into aerotech, battleforce, or mechwarrior (RPG) though I did have all the stuff for them. What a young n00b, I had a limited edition Ral Partha Phoenix Hawk LAM bundled with my Crescent Hawk's Inception game and had no idea what to do with it. Figured it was metal so I'd have to MELT THE PIECES TOGETHER. So I did with a soldering iron. Ah, so much for the resale value on that collectible, huh?

There was also a magazine that was fun called Battle Technology.

http://www.lski.org/pictures/tabletopga ... .%20050108)/BattleTechnology%20Magazine%20Issue%20Index.pdf

This was pre-internet days I was into it so I could never find all the issues.

Anyway, I'll stop rambling and let this go back to the MO complaints. ;) (I stopped playing after MW2: Ghost Bear, couldn't get into Mercs and the others)
 
kamikaziechameleon
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Fri Oct 04, 2013 11:52 am

I read about 10 books as a kid scattered across the time lines. Whatever they had on the shelf at the local barns and noble and bought them all.

The simplest way to explain the literary stylings of those books is tom clancy sci-fi. The multiple perspectives and immersive level of detail was so thrilling. You could imagine each and every scene to the detail as you would read it.

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Every character and their individual motivations and history and complexity. The same goes for the mechs and battles... It was a space opera of sorts played out over hundreds of years. hmmm... I've always contemplated jumping back in and starting from the beginning. I also read the Magic the gathering books,

Image

not nearly on the level of battle tech books but with a few stand outs. Anyone read the Godzilla stuff from the 90's?

Image

This genre of contemporary pop culture pulp/sci-fi/fantasy was the best kind of merchandising. I guess that fan fiction on the internet is starting to replace this kinda publishing.

Oh my child hood I probably read 5,000 or more pages of literature from this genre every summer in addition to my comic book reading.
 
NovusBogus
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Fri Oct 04, 2013 12:17 pm

Hawkwing74 wrote:
One question relevant to the game...is it all pvp? I don't think I would enjoy getting stomped by people who have been playing a long time while I get my feet wet.

It's TF2 with mechs so yeah. They have a system in place to try and match people of comparable skill so it's not a one-sided stomp but it's 100% multiplayer combat.
 
Scrotos
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Fri Oct 04, 2013 2:50 pm

kamikaziechameleon wrote:
I read about 10 books as a kid scattered across the time lines. Whatever they had on the shelf at the local barns and noble and bought them all.

The simplest way to explain the literary stylings of those books is tom clancy sci-fi. The multiple perspectives and immersive level of detail was so thrilling. You could imagine each and every scene to the detail as you would read it.


If you're going to re-read, I'd recommend the books by Michael A. Stackpole. I think he was the best writer in that universe. I obviously didn't read any of the later stuff like you linked to, but I did read some. I think the Robert Thurston trilogy I read was decent and while the trilogy from William H. Keith, Jr. was ok, the quality wasn't as good as Stackpole. I did enjoy some of the Robert N. Charrette books, too. After 1991 I stopped readin' 'em.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_BattleTech_novels

I mean, I couldn't get into some of them:

A DEST (Draconis Elite Strike Team) group, accompanied by a small mercenary group, make a misjump from Kurita space and land on a planet inhabited by 500-year-old colonists and a mysterious alien lifeform. Amidst their battles to survive and return to the inner sphere, they form a bond with highly intelligent birds who see them as the fulfillment of their own prophecy.

...really?
 
Hawkwing74
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Fri Oct 04, 2013 3:01 pm

Totally agree, if I was to re-read, I would only read Stackpole. I did re-read most of them 5 years back. They are not great art, but quite fun.
I just hated that he built up Victor as the hero who would rebuild the Star League, then it all went to pot.
 
druidcent
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Tue Oct 08, 2013 4:15 pm

It may have been 3063.. I think it was introduced when they released the BattleTech Master Rules, which updated the core-rule book. The reissued TROs and Mechsheets had Battle Value. (There was also something called Combat Value, and I can't remember which of the two was messed up, and they had to retweak the formula).

Sun-Tzu became a very interesting character.. I had a similar reaction.

The BattleTech books are definitely popcorn sci-fi... It's fun, and decent, but I wouldn't call it a masterpiece. I like Stackpole, but I can't say Iiked Thurston at all.. I found his writing too one-dimensional.
 
kamikaziechameleon
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Re: Mechwarrior Online

Mon Oct 14, 2013 9:33 am

druidcent wrote:
It may have been 3063.. I think it was introduced when they released the BattleTech Master Rules, which updated the core-rule book. The reissued TROs and Mechsheets had Battle Value. (There was also something called Combat Value, and I can't remember which of the two was messed up, and they had to retweak the formula).

Sun-Tzu became a very interesting character.. I had a similar reaction.

The BattleTech books are definitely popcorn sci-fi... It's fun, and decent, but I wouldn't call it a masterpiece. I like Stackpole, but I can't say Iiked Thurston at all.. I found his writing too one-dimensional.


Certainly, the core elements of these books or any such fiction is the setting. Coming up with a compelling story to keep you involved and let you live in the universe for a bit.

I feel like the Premium Sci-fi literature out there is more about ideas than the premise. The premise is in the book jacket, the actual high concept ideas that flow through great sci-fi and fantasy are so utterly profound that they change the way you look at the world you life in.

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