Mechwarrior Online

[Falconeer]

Anyway, megapatch delayed about 24 hours.

[5150]

When you got warm, you slowed down.  When you got warmer, the TSM would kick in, remove the speed penalty, and make you faster on top of that.  When you got warmer still, the speed penalties would continue to accrue and eventually negate the TSM bonus, though you'd still be moving faster than a non-TSM mech in the same circumstances.  But more importantly it would boost the mech's physical attacks by 50% when active, so TSM on a heavy mech with a hatchet would result in a death monster that was hitting harder than an AC/20 and only on the upper body, so higher odds of getting the head.  As long as you were careful with heat management, you'd wind up with something that could sprint across the map faster than anything else of its weight class and proceed to demolish the crap out of most other targets.

Of course, this also required running into point blank range while being shot at a lot.  Heavy armor's pretty much required.

It was one of the few InnerSphere Tech advantages as well, if I remember correctly.

I only ever had one player use TSM exactly once on the tabletop. He constructed a dual hatchet mech solely around overheating and getting into melee range as quickly as possible.

In the one game this mech was used he spent every turn firing every weapon (not even electing to fire the weapons at an opponent) while heading full speed towards the enemy, who was blowing chunks off him the whole time.

He arrived in melee range just as in time for his opponent to land the fatal shot

[5150]

Anyway, megapatch delayed about 24 hours.

Given that it didnt happen yesterday I think they'll probably shut it to next week now

Good job they pushed open beta back if the patch is giving them trouble!

[Falconeer]

It's SUPERCONFIRMED for today. Which means nothing.

[Arthur_Parker]

Servers are patching now, there are strong indications that they are going to do a full wipe.  This is possibly the start of open beta.

[Evildrider]

The hero mech Yen Lo Wang has a 30% c-bill boost, a unique paint scheme, and it's a unique variant.

[Arthur_Parker]

MechWarrior Online BETA Update

Build Version 1.0.134 (That's right.. Version 1.0!!!)
 
Patch Date - Thursday Oct. 25th @ 10AM – 1:30PM PDT
 
UPDATE
 
Another push towards Open Beta and we’ve been very busy.
 
Not only are there numerous fixes and improvements on existing systems, we’ve also added the Cicada (CDA) to the BattleMech lineup as well as 3 more variants of existing Mechs.  On top of all of that, we’ve added new upgrades.  Ferro Fibrous armor, Endo-Steel Internal Structure and Double Heat Sinks are now in the game!
 
Ferro Fibrous armor is going to give you a bit more survivability on the battlefield; it is a little lighter, but at the cost of critical space.  Endo-Steel Internal Structure frees up tonnage on your Mech at the cost of critical space.  This is an advantage for the heavier Mechs in the Mech line-up.  Double Heat Sinks will double the heat dissipation at the same tonnage cost, but take up 3 times the amount of critical space.
 
To accommodate these new additions in MechLab, there is a new flow that has been introduced in terms of interface.  Check out the new tabs just under the MechLab tab when you enter.  While you’re here, you may also want to check in on your PilotLab Modules.  There’s a new module there that will give you a new aiming system to play with.  Just remember, you press “V” to activate it.
 
We've also made changes to the economy of the game.  Firstly, we standardized MC to C-Bill pricing. Secondly, we've lowered engine prices and item prices have been increased. This all adds up to, Mech costs being the sum of it's parts.  While it doesn't follow the canon pricing, it is close.
 


Graph of Mech Prices, from Light to Assault
 
As you can see, the average MC cost now (green line), is much lower than previous (dashed red line).  Now, you get more value for your MC, as an Atlas AS7-D, for example, is not the same cost as an Atlas AS7-K. This helps reflect the fact that many variants have more sophisticated equipment, and thus are worth more. So to sum up: Average MC cost for Mechs is much lower, and there are spikes in MC cost for Mechs with advanced equipment.
 
The rest of the changes are in the patch notes below and we hope to see you take advantage of the new features in combat.  Now get out there and pop a Jenner!
 
P.S. Those of you who have purchased the December issue of PC Gamer will now have your Mech Skin and Coconut Monkey Bobblehead!

Change Log

GENERAL
 
User Data:
 
We will be resetting:
BattleMech Inventory
Item Inventory
C-Bills AND MechWarrior Credits (MC)
Premium Account Time
Mech XP and all Mech Trees (Efficiencies)
Pilot Trees (Modules)
We then credit:
Founder’s Packages
MC Purchases
75% of your C-Bills earned since Sept 18,2012
Mech XP earned since Sept 18,2012
We won't be resetting:
User accounts, friends lists
NEW BATTLEMECHS:
Jenner JR7-K
Raven RVN-3L
Cicada CDA-2A
Cicada CDA-2B
Cicada CDA-3C
Cicada CDA-3M
Awesome AWS-9M
NOTE: The Centurion CN9-D will be appearing on November 6th.  We understand that you will not be able to elite the Centurion line until then.  We apologize for the delay as the CN9-D is reliant on the Artemis guidance system.

FRONT END
 
New flow in MechLab:
Configure button is now removed. Configuration is now done through the section tabs
The section tabs (Loadout, Modules, etc.) are now directly accessible after selection of your ‘Mech
The section tabs can now only be accessed one at a time (you must save or cancel to go to another tab)
Engine heat sinks
Engines with a rating of 275 or greater can contain one or more heat sinks inside of them without taking up critical slots.
There is now a mechanism to add/remove these heat sinks (previously these heat sinks were fixed within the engine). The number of spots available and the number of spots taken are shown in the equipped engine
When removing an engine, any heat sinks within the engine are also removed
The number of heat sinks the engine is capable of holding is the same regardless of whether the ‘Mech uses single or double heat sinks
New Upgrades tab - upgrades are options that affect the ‘Mech as a whole, there are currently three upgrade types to choose from:
 
Armor (currently selectable are Standard and Ferro-Fibrous)
Changing your armor type automatically replaces all of your armor with the new type
Cost of the upgrade is a fixed price for the conversion (based on max tonnage of the ‘Mech) plus the cost of whatever armor of the new type you need to buy. Having an amount of armor of the proper type in your inventory will therefore reduce the cost of the upgrade
Armor types other than Standard take up critical slots (14 for Ferro-Fibrous). These slots will be floating (see below)
Structure (currently selectable are Standard and Endo-Steel)
 
Cost of the upgrade is a fixed price based on max tonnage of the ‘Mech
Structure affects tonnage of the ‘Mech (Endo-Steel is lighter)
Armor types other than Standard take up critical slots (14 for Endo-Steel). These slots will be floating (see below)
Heat sinks (select between single and double)
Selects whether your ‘Mech may use single or double heat sinks. Only one type of heat sink may be used on a ‘Mech at a time
Cost of the upgrade is a fixed price
Engines are also automatically upgraded to double the heat sink capability
When heat sink type is changed, all heat sinks are removed from the ‘Mech and new heat sinks of the proper type must be installed (and bought if necessary)
Floating slots
Some upgrades take up critical slots. These slots are auto-flowed into available empty slots
If a floating slot appears in white, other items can be dragged on to it and it will be moved to an available slot somewhere else on the ‘Mech
If a floating slot appears in yellow, then there is no open empty slot that it can be moved to and so can not be used for other items
Floating slots are ignored in the critical hit system
GAMEPLAY
Running into another Mech will no longer knock it down.
Line of sight check now higher on Mech so targeting can occur when only 25% of the mech is visible over a hill instead of 50%
Explosions explode on the surface of the water and spawn water explosion effects
AC/Gauss/PPC type weapons now pass through water and deal a reduced amount of damage depending on depth of the hit
Laser water hit effects spawn at the correct location on the surface of the water and deal a reduced amount of damage depending on depth of the hit
Added Picture in Picture Zoom module. (Default mapped key for advanced zoom is 'V')
Added Current active Vision mode status in HUD
Extend range finder to 2500m( was 1500m )
Cockpit light will now flicker after taking hard hits
MOVEMENT IMPROVEMENTS:
Animation shaking under various circumstances
‘smoother’ jump jetting behavior
Weapon hit detection more in-line with where you see the mech on your screen (don’t have to shoot infront of your mech so much) especially at lower frame rates were the problem was the worst.
BUG FIXES
Two AMS on a Mech (AS7-K) now correctly destroy double the missiles
PPC’s will no longer cross at extreme ranges
Players are no longer able to zoom or change vision modes when a Mech is shut down 
Zoom and Vision modes are tuned off when a Mech shuts down
Target hit indication for missiles now correctly only goes off when explosion damage is dealt
Users can no longer specify an FOV less than 60.0 degrees in the user.cfg
We thank you for your patience and we look forward to seeing you on the battlefield!

- The MechWarrior® Online™ Team

MechWarrior® Online™
Piranha Games Inc.
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
http://mwomercs.com/

Good patch, real nice but you can't knock mechs over anymore which I'm real sad about.

[Amaron]

I think they're a bit crazy to launch without new pilot trees/unlocks.  The ones they have right now are extremely anemic.

[Falconeer]

No knockdowns is pretty weird. I hope it's a change that has to do with a future revamp of the whole collision system, because it really makes no sense to just remove it altogether.

EDIT: Yeah, Technical Director Matthew Craig confirms it:

The rationale behind removing collisions is not to get rid of it but to disable while we take time to get it working correctly.

More, from Paul Inouye:

I'll address the two big questions I see here... Where did the Centurion CN9-AH go and why did knock downs get removed.

First off, the CN9-AH was our test vehicle for what we could do for Yen-Lo Wang. It was the closest variant we would use without exposing what the first Hero Mech was going to be. Now that Yen-Lo Wang is announced and present, we have removed the CN9-AH and will be replacing it with the CN9-D with the Artemis Guidance System in the next Mech release pack.

As for knockdowns, they were broken... plain and simple. I had been asking for a while now to have them removed until we get both the physics and the network side of Mech movement down properly so it a) doesn't look horrible and  doesn't cause the weird warping around as the Mechs stand back up. This mechanic will come back when we properly introduce charging/knockdown gameplay.

I'll check into the DHS system. Seems a bit light to me as well.

[Arthur_Parker]

Russ Bullock on Open Beta

Hey Everyone

I would like to address this to the core community of MechWarrior Online. You guys are absolutely the most loyal community in all of gaming, intense! But far and away the most loyal. To explain what I mean by loyal let me start out with a huge thanks to all of our Founders. The program was quite obviously a huge success, in fact at 5.2 Million it has set a new high bar for these types of programs. That is a huge statement to just how amazing the MechWarrior franchise and it’s unique and exciting play mechanics are, and now a whole new generation of gamers are about to learn that. These founders have made it possible for us to make the game better and to make better choices these past 4 months, with each of those choices leading to a better overall product.

Since we have just today announced Open Beta for Monday October 29th, I wanted to address that with the community. During this past year we have learned an incredible amount when it comes to listening and managing a community. Over the course of that year we have listened, learned and then reacted to many topics that have come up. One topic that has always been a major point of conversation is the topic of Open Beta and when the product would be ready for it. This one in particular has always been fascinating to me, for the most part I wondered why people in the community even cared when the product went Open Beta, after all they were already playing the game and enjoying it, what did it matter to them when the product went Open Beta? Of course after studying the subject you start to understand and list off the various reasons people have. But I was also filled with the belief that each of those concerns is very easily addressed, and I will list off a few here:

1) I don’t want to spend money on the game until it has more content – This one is very easy to address as Open Beta launch will represent the FINAL data wipe, therefore players will be starting over one last time. This also means that all of their MC, if they have purchased any, or the entirety of the Founders rewards will be reimbursed completely: therefore you get to choose when the time is right to spend your MC currency.
2) I don’t think it’s fair that my Founders premium account should start at Open Beta - At an estimated Nov 13th patch all Founders will have their premium time reset once again (two free weeks of premium time!) and be given a “button” that allows Founders the opportunity to choose exactly when to start their premium time. It will not start counting down until you, the Founder, decide it is worth it.
3) Oh no it can’t be Open Beta because the game still does not have X Feature or Y piece of content, I can’t believe MWO will not said feature or content – I think all of us get caught up in the retail product mentality. Just because MWO is going Open Beta in no way means we are finished making the game or that we will even slowdown in the slightest. We already have nine months of work lined up in front of us and frankly there is no end to the work in sight. We could easily delay Open Beta endlessly to just wait for one more feature or one more piece of content which could easily become a black hole.
4) I love MechWarrior and I want the whole world to love it too, but if it goes out too soon that may not happen – This is a great point of passion that we share with you, but there are just limits to what we can do and how long we can hold off on launching the product. But let’s not lose sight of the fact that the core MWO experience is a ton of fun. All of the media previews from PC Gamer to Penny Arcade agree, the core experience is extremely addictive and fun - we already have what most games never end up finding. Now we just need to add more content and more features, that’s great we can do that and will.
Now that I have talked about some of the feelings the community has expressed regarding Open Beta, let me try and explain some of the reasons why we feel the time is right:

1) We just can’t ask more of our closed beta testers - The closed beta testers have done an amazing job, but many of you - including many founders - are just plain fatigued at having their data wiped. In fact according to our data we even have 10’s of thousands of Founders that are just waiting for Open Beta to play again so that their play time is not wasted. It is time for us to get into Open Beta and stop the data wipes.
2) We can’t effectively test certain things any further with our current community – In many ways we can’t effectively test systems both in back end infrastructure and game systems without both more and different types of players. We need to bring in new non-core players to determine what aspects of MWO interface, etc need to be changed and exactly how they should be changed. We can’t make proper headway in these areas without Open Beta.
3) Customer Support, server stress – we just need to take the next step in our player base to be able to stress and then take these systems to the next level.
In the end there are many reasons across all aspects of running a large game like this that tell us we need to take the next step in order to continue to improve the product at the pace we want to. I hope this information helps you guys in the community understand more clearly the reasoning behind our decisions. I know that almost all the questions and concerns we get from the community is because you care a great deal about this product and really desire to see it successful. Many of you wonder what it is you can do to help make this game a success. Of course many of you purchased Founders packages, which was an immense help, but how else can you help? Please be a huge positive force on the forums, social feeds and most importantly in the game. If you see a new player needing help, take the time to inform them on the nuances of MechWarrior and how they can get better at the game. Help us spread the word and bring new players to the game. Continue to submit support tickets with any issues or bugs you find in the game, as well as continue to provide us your feedback but strive to keep the emotion out of your opinions.

I hope this has been helpful, and once again thanks for your support. I will talk to you again soon.

Russ Bullock
President
Piranha Games Inc.

Few issues they need to sort...

[Falconeer]

Interesting bits on teh Yen Lo Wang and what we have to expect from future Premium Mechs (and the whole Pay 2 Win topic):

There’s been a lot of concern recently about Yen-Lo-Wang being overpowered or pay to win so I’d like to take a chance to clear up some things. Though this post is meant to be brief, giving you a look at what’s to come, with more details to be revealed later.

Yen-Lo-Wang was our first attempt at giving individual variants little quirks, for balancing purposes as well as to give them character.

Just for clarification, Yen-Lo-Wang has fewer hardpoints than any other Centurion, and his weapon arm is limited to only moving up and down (as opposed to side to side). To balance this out, he was given an extra module slot, as well as small boosts to torso and arm movement speed, and torso twist angle.

This is our first attempt at a “quirks system”, one that will eventually be applied to ALL Mechs, and admittedly look outs of place when the Yen-Lo-Wang is the only one. To put things into perspective, as an example (and remember that this is only an EXAMPLE) the Centurion CN9-A could end up with a greater reverse maximum speed and a slight boost to its torso twist angle. And the CN9-AL could have a greater speed and range of motion in its weapon arm (complete with side to side movement!).

We hope to have a big update, in which every Mech gets a pass through the quirks system, into the game within the next few weeks.

[Falconeer]

And it's on!
New website, and Open beta go go go. Also, massive reset to everything.

[Merusk]

I don't have time to deal with this now. How do you pause your premium acct.

[Falconeer]

Oh, that. Don't worry. Your premium time is elapsing now, but at some point you'll get a one-time Pause/Reset Button that will allow you to restore it to full and decide when to activate it.

[Evildrider]

Oh, that. Don't worry. Your premium time is elapsing now, but at some point you'll get a one-time Pause/Reset Button that will allow you to restore it to full and decide when to activate it.

They said about 2 weeks from now.

[Amaron]

Oh, that. Don't worry. Your premium time is elapsing now, but at some point you'll get a one-time Pause/Reset Button that will allow you to restore it to full and decide when to activate it.

Isn't it just going to automatically pause until you press the button?

[Der Helm]

Mine was already activated.

[Falconeer]

Official word on it:

NOTE: Premium Time will be ticking down again. You will receive one final reset in the near future to restore your premium time to full. When this happens, a time inject button will be made available. This button will allow you to chose when your Founder's Premium Time begins. More details to follow in the coming weeks.

[Arthur_Parker]

Working on basic skills for my third jenner, having a lot of fun.  Some people are really terrible at this game.

[Ironwood]

While I don't have a lot of free time these days, I logged in for a quick match and after nineteen hours of patching played one.

I quite liked the changes and enjoyed the match.

[Lantyssa]

I'm trying to avoid spending any MC.  Thankfully I'm building up c-bills at a decent enough pace that I should still be able to by my Commando and Dragon before long.

[Arthur_Parker]

If you don't repair armour and ammo, you get 75% of each free.  Ferro Fibrous armour should be avoided till they tweak it, it doesn't save you that much weight and it drastically increases your repair bills, endo steel is a much better option.  The only double heat sinks that work correctly are the ones not part of your engine, it's uncertain if they mean to change that.

I agree, I'd save MC purely for mech bays, nothing else is worth spending it on at the minute.

Edit to add, also there doesn't seem to be a downside to not repairing items, most of the time I only repair structure & repair armour on lights only.

[Falconeer]

This probably doesn't make much sense, but I feel like saving my MC for when Community Warfare will be live. I can't help but thinking the game is not really "ready" until they implement that part, and resets or not I don't want to commit to anything until things get serious.

That said, I enjoy playing it and I can't really feel any "grind" as long as I am piloting something I like, although I have to admit that having the 4 starting 'mechs to play with from the get go helps a lot.

I also noticed that we've been credited 20k MC, which is about 90 dollars if you decided to purchase them now. Plus the four founder 'mechs that have a significant XP and c-bill boost... I am not gonna say that the 120$ package was "a bargain" but considering how much I like the game I can't help but thinking it was money well spent it (even though I have no idea what to spend the 20k on).

[Shannow]

This probably doesn't make much sense, but I feel like saving my MC for when Community Warfare will be live. I can't help but thinking the game is not really "ready" until they implement that part, and resets or not I don't want to commit to anything until things get serious.

Makes complete sense. In fact I feel zero motivation to log on until they start implementing that part.

[Slayerik]

Hmmm, I'm having fun just playing. We'll see for how long, but spent a few hours last night horribly piloting my Jenner.

[Falconeer]

That's the thing. I've been loving to just play this game for months now, through all the buggy iterations. I can't even imagine what it will become once Community Warfare hits.

[tmp]

Thought i'd check the game out since there's open beta now.

Registration supposedly sends verification email. The email never makes it to my account. When i try to log in, i get a notification: "Your account is not verified.
Please check your spam/junk folder for your activation email. Click here to resend your verification email."

except there's no link or anything to actually click on "there" to send the verification mail again

[eldaec]

For me the game is fun the way tf2 is fun. Not sure I see community warfare helping much. I'm not going to be part of any worthwhile organised gang, but the straight furball is fun.

[Falconeer]

The way I see it Community Warfare, on top of adding the obvious layer of metagaming that makes every game in existence much better, and the layer of persistence that makes the games I like much better, will just raise the quality of the single battles since players won't just mindlessly charge in to get fast kills or XP, and will have instead to play a much more tactical game. Considering this is still Battletech/Mechwarrior I see that as a very good thing, in the spirit of the original game where every lost unit was a big deal. And this is not even counting the lore, which I personally like a lot.

I am not sure if your lack of enthusiasm comes from what happened with the equivalent of Community Warfare in World of Tanks (not much for all I know), but I'd say the absolute lack of lore (or the complete mashup of very-historic vehicles versus anti-historic engagements) in WoT contributed to people not caring that much. I don't think MWO will ever be Eve, not even close, but I think any kind of tool that will facilitate clan warfare, territorial conquest or simply organized group play as an exciting improvement.

[Ironwood]

I don't think it's going to work the way you think it's going to work.

[Falconeer]

One year old, but this is all we have, isn't it?

DEV BLOG 1 - COMMUNITY WARFARE
It’s been a month since the launch of MechWarrior® Online™’s website and we’ve generated a lot of buzz and content.  As promised last week, we’ve prepared a developer blog about Community Warfare.

Since Community Warfare is a large topic, we decided to focus this blog on one specific topic, the Inner Sphere and Faction Warfare.

Contributors for this blog include Paul Inouye and Bryan Ekman.

Inner Sphere
It all starts with the concept of the Inner Sphere and a living timeline.  Each day that passes here on Earth, also passes in the virtual MechWarrior® Online™ Inner Sphere. 

Wednesday December 7th, 2011 is Wednesday December 7th, 3048.

This means every time you log into MechWarrior® Online™something new has happened.  News Updates via the ISN feed, news reporter features, and battle feeds, keep players up-to-date on current events.  Feeds can be viewed through a dynamic universe map or RSS style feed, in game or online at the MechWarrior® Online™website (coming soon).

For those unfamiliar with what the Inner Sphere looks like, here’s a map:


(zoom)

Faction Warfare
The Inner Sphere is broken up into several factions, each with their own regions and sub-regions.  Each faction is warring with at least one other faction at all times in a universal territory battle.  Players can be active or passive participants in this battle by following one of three paths:

Pledging Allegiance to a Faction
Joining a Mercenary Corporation
Remaining Neutral

At its core, the territory battle is a fight for resources – planets.  Planets are divided into three types. Each type requires a more active level of participation by the player and as a result earns a greater reward.

Core Worlds – Are managed by the dev team.  These are worlds that necessary for future planning and part of major historical events.
Faction Worlds – Are fought over by Faction players.  These planets buffer core and border worlds, and do not play a significant role in major historical events.  Rewards for controlling these planets are directly linked to global bonuses and abilities associated with a player’s Faction.
Border Worlds – Are fought over via a contract bidding system by player run Mercenary Corporations.  These planets change hands on a regular basis, and have no impact on historical events.  Rewards for controlling a boarder world are significant and go directly to the occupying Merc Corp.
It’s important to state now, that worlds can change from Border to Faction to Core, or any combination thereof, at any time by the development team.  This will be necessary to facilitate dramatic changes in faction territory control as we progress through some tumultuous times within the BattleTech® universe.

Faction Worlds

The battle for control over faction planets is a simple war of attrition.  The faction with the most influence over a particular planet occupies it.  By virtue of simply competing in online matches, faction players contribute influence points to target planets.

Border Worlds

Mercenary Corporations can bid and fight for occupation rights of border worlds throughout the Inner Sphere.  Merc Corps must bid on a planet’s occupation rights via a system of contracts generated by the game.

A match or series of matches are set up between the defending Merc Corp and the challenger.  The victor is determined from the results of each match, and takes control of the planet.  They are rewarded with an immediate contract payout, and will continue to earn rewards while they occupy the planet.

Loyalty Points and Ranks
Loyalty Points are used to determine how devoted you have been to a particular faction.  The more loyal you are, the greater the reward.  LPs are earned by engaging in activities that further the goals of a particular faction.

For Example:  Killing an enemy faction player would earn 1 LP.

Loyalty Points decay over time if a player is not active.  Participating in negative actions can also decrease LPs.

Faction Players

As a Faction Player, loyalty points are earned by playing and winning matches.  As the player accumulates loyalty points, they will gain a military faction rank at pre-determined loyalty point totals.  If a player loses LPs by decay or negative actions, they will be demoted.

Gaining ranks earns special privileges and items, including membership to special units, unit skins, and bonuses to C-Bills and XP.  These are all non-permanent and subject to the player maintaining a certain rank level.  At the highest possible levels, players can begin to influence their faction by controlling which planets are targeted in territory conquest.

Mercenary Corp Players

As a Mercenary Corporation, all members’ earned loyalty points go to the Merc Corp.  The Merc Corp must have a minimum amount of loyalty points with a faction before they are able to engage in planetary combat on behalf of that faction.  Loyalty points also determine the type and level of contract a Merc Corp is permitted to bid on.  These loyalty point restrictions mean that a Merc Corp’s membership, must remain active in order to maintain the required level of LPs.

Ranks are created within a Merc Corp by the Merc Corp leader.  The naming of the ranks is entirely up to the Merc Corp leader who can assign Merc Corp level permissions to each rank.

Lone Wolf Players

As a lone wolf, the player can earn loyalty points through participation in random matches, however these LPs have no positive or negative implications.  A lone wolf player does not have any ranks.

Disclaimer

We’re committed to releasing information about BETA ready concepts only, however some ideas and concepts are still subject to change after testing.

[Ironwood]

 in the spirit of the original game where every lost unit was a big deal.

This is the bit I was  about.  This is just not going to happen.

Nothing in what you've linked suggests it really either.

[eldaec]

I'm quite sure people will care about CW. I just won't be one of them.

And I suspect the same is true of 98% of people reading this thread, even if they don't know it yet.

It is going to be like any other sport PvP team shooter. Jolly good fun but with stiff barriers to entry arising from a high skill cap and a need to play in a team of organised people to make it work.

[Slayerik]

What's your favorite mech, and why? I have some c-bills saved and kinda deciding between hunchback now or catapult in a night or two.....

[Goreschach]

Hunchback just hasn't been very interesting since the engine nerf. It used to have a lot of lasers with good speed, now it's basically just an underarmored Awesome. Cata, however, is one of the best chassis in the game. The k2 dual gauss is one of the best snipers in the game, and the a1 has 6 missile slots, making it one of the best boats in the game.