Mechwarrior Online

[Lantyssa]

You sure that was twenty-five thousand and not twenty-five hundred?  I could believe the latter.  Well, I could believe the former, too, but it's much sadder.

[Falconeer]

25k. I heard it myself but it is confirmed by this recap of what was said in the episode. I am copy-pasting as a form of light news about MWO.

NGNG#115
Hosts: Phil "Sean Lang", Daeron "Bombadil"
Co-Hosts: Brandon "Cattra Kell", Tyler "JagerXII"
Special Guest: Russ Bullock, President @ Piranha Games

Discussion Topic: The Clan Invasion
Approx. 25,000 Clan Packages sold (about 50% of those were Masakari Packages)
Still injecting approx. 500 Clan 'Mechs a day
Inner Sphere vs. Clan balance
Dire Whale: 2xERPPC, 2xGAUSS
The next Clan 'Mech

Discussion Topic: New MatchMaker
Solo/Group Queues
More fine-tuning
Inner Sphere vs. Clan events now possible

Discussion Topic: Maps
Map production has begun again
"Mech Factory" industrial city map likely first, then "Swamp"
PGI open to community input regarding future map production and direction

Discussion Topic: Community Warfare
Merc Corp association is step 1 and will hopefully be ready in August
The basics of CW combat and planetary conquest by end of 2014

Discussion Topic: Jump Jet & Fall Damage Changes
Is fall damage too punishing? No it isn't.

They are considering preventing 2 Gauss to shoot at the same time with 2 PPC. Either 2 Gauss and 1 PPC or 2 PPC and 1 Gauss. The spare one gets a "cooldown/delay". Explanation: the power plant cannot sustain all that power output at the same time.

[Samprimary]

"activation of a gauss rifle's charge period prevents the firing of any PPC within a second of the use of gauss rifle charging, whether the gauss was fired or not"

additionally, doing a heat-for-projectile-speed trade would be great to seriously decouple ppcs from gauss

[Hoax]

Oh good more game ruining complicated tack on systems that nobody will know about beforehand instead of just adding cone of fire. Fucking awesome.

[Zetleft]

Played for the first time in a long time.  Gameplay is as I remembered but holy shit is that mech lab shitty.  I don't think I'm gonna change out any equipment in my mechs anytime soon. 

[Falconeer]

To be fair, while the new mechlab is an unexcusable HUGE STEP BACK, and basically a deadly piece of shit, you get used to it after a while and messing with your 'mechs becomes almost OK.

[Falconeer]

From the PGI office, a Community Warfare Inner Sphere map sneek peek.

[Falconeer]

"Childish Satisfaction" picture of the day. It's worth noting though that me with a Griffin and the other Inner Sphere medium 'mech, a Shadow Hawk, have scored 11 out of 12 kills. Take that, filthy Clanners.

[Shannow]

Wait, where's Tboz and Chilli?

[Falconeer]

Busy recording apocryphal music.

[Hoax]

Whats with the 2x exp stuff? Why is every mech 2x xp and is that real?

Also with the trial mechs being the (C) versions now how does that work in terms of exp. Like if you buy the normal variant after using the (C) mech are you going to transfer over exp or do you lose it unless you get the (C) vers?

How the fuck can these maps suck so much? Why are there so many hills that make you feel small, why is skiing a thing in a mech game. God I fucking hate these maps, you might be able to overcome most of the stupidity if the maps were great but they are total shit.

[Falconeer]

The 2XP thing is for your first win of every day.

Not sure about the XP you make with trial/champion 'mechs. Clearly they are good 'mechs now but I can't remember if ou can make any experience with them or it's lost until you buy your personal one.

Maps mostlly suck, yeah.

[5150]

IIRC Champions are 15% cbill bonus (heros are 30% and founders are 25%). Clan mechs work differently, my understanding is that the bonus is split among the prime omni pods (not sure how thats going to work when the primes are available for cbills......)

You do gain xp on trial mechs but you can't spend it on boxes until you own the chassis

[Falconeer]

Dark Horizons: Mechanized Corps. http://store.steampowered.com/app/266470/      

[Hoax]

IIRC Champions are 15% cbill bonus (heros are 30% and founders are 25%). Clan mechs work differently, my understanding is that the bonus is split among the prime omni pods (not sure how thats going to work when the primes are available for cbills......)

You do gain xp on trial mechs but you can't spend it on boxes until you own the chassis

I know you used to gain xp on trials and then if you bought the chassis it was there for you.

I know the whole idea of the Champ mechs.

What I don't know is if you use the JR7-F Champ mech for free bc trial a bunch and then buy the JR7-F normal mech will you have 0 xp or does the xp carry over to the normal version?

[Falconeer]

What I don't know is if you use the JR7-F Champ mech for free bc trial a bunch and then buy the JR7-F normal mech will you have 0 xp or does the xp carry over to the normal version?

The XP carry over, according to what 5150 says and what I actually remember (now) too.

[Lantyssa]

Yeah, champion 'mechs don't have their own skill lines.  They share the base model.  The (C) and (F) tags just act as a bonus at the end of a match.

[Falconeer]

Biggest leech ever?

Don't get me wrong, I am not proud of this, at all...

[Samprimary]

any of you around? I need to procure friends' talents for staged matches

[Sir T]

I can't sleep so I'll see if you are still around.

[Samprimary]

Friend "Suicidal Alphastrike"

[Sir T]

Friend thingie sent

[Hoax]

So what setting do I need to turn up so that NV or Thermal are even halfway useful? Even in the tunnel night vision is just a green mess that does not help and thermal seems to have a max vision that is way less than what I can see with it off.

Also I cannot get over how shit these maps are and how shit jj's are. I don't like jets but using trial mechs I often have them. They feel terrible.

This fucking game has so many moments where you feel so shitty as a player, falling down hills, sliding down hills, trying to climb up hills, using jump jets to do anything but arrest free falls or bunny hop tiny things... I don't remember it being this bad.

[Merusk]

Thermal is only useful close-range on night maps so you can see tiny bits poking out from behind buildings or catch the 'through holes' in debris.  It used to be predator-mode but they nerfed it to hell and back because all other vision modes were inferior.

NV was never useful when I played, even on night maps.  They weren't full-dark enough to justify using it over normal vision and it was always inferior to Thermal even with increased range of vision.

[Hoax]

  RIP Predator Vision.

I don't mind them going away from the time when Thermal was just hands down superior to everything else but I'm hard pressed to come up with any reason to use vision modes so far after coming back. I used to use NV on some maps I feel like.

[Falconeer]

In all honesty, I *have to* use thermal vision in both Forest Colony and Frozen City. I know they are daylight maps, but thermal vision just removes a lot of distractions for my eyes and make it easier for me to aim. Especially in some areas of frozen city where there's a lot of fog. About thermal, I consider it a necessity in River City Night. But as you pointed out they are not mandatory, in all cases if your eyes adjust quick enough you an do without it and both thermal and night visions have severe drawbacks (limited range for NV, lack of depth for thermal). I like them, and they have already hinted at more foggy maps. But then again, it's all about how good your eyes are. Mine aren't good at all and all the three vision modes come in handy.

[Sir T]

The particular gamma setting of your monitor come into play as well. I cant see a thing without night vision on river city night.

[Lantyssa]

Same here.  It's nearly pitch black for me.

[Samprimary]

I hate but am glad that Predator Vision is gone, but I hate it but I am glad it is gone.

When Predator Vision was a thing the entire game quickly became nothing but predator vision and there was no variety in environs whatsoever (unless you counted that Caustic was a generally green backdrop to every other map's blue). Everything was a grainy bluefield backdrop with mechs contrasted heavily against it even from behind smoke and flare and even if they were just peeked out a little bit. POW.

Maybe it could become a super premium Clan thing to represent their general superiority at everything, eh? EH?

[Merusk]

Oh hey.. THAT's how you balance clan vs. IS.  Give IS old Thermal vision.

[Falconeer]

All Hero 'mechs are 50% off for the weekend.

[Falconeer]

THE GAUSS / PARTICLE PROJECTION DIRECTIVE

For those of you who don't know, there's a problem with the Direwolf and its ability to mount 2 Gauss Rifles and 2 PPC and shoot them at the same time for about 50 (and change) pinpoint damage to one location from long range. It can do it over and over with very little drawbacks, if at all. Solutions are needed, so PGI came up with two ideas. One idiotic, the other one unpopular but in my opinion quite cool and needed.

Hey folks,

I'm going to pre-empt the concern that nothing has happened with the PPC/Gauss combination in the game and Russ mentioning work being done on it for this patch.

The new firing mechanic that Russ was mentioning is indeed in the game right now but it is set to off. The reason for this is that it's a very complex active system which is going to directly affect your weapon triggering. Yes we have complex systems in the game like Heat Scale but Heat Scale is passive. There's a big difference in a player's experience when the active triggering mechanism is changed, much like the Gauss Charge. The Gauss Charge however is a single stage active change, the Gauss/PPC system that is on hold right now is a 3 stage active change.

The Mechanic:
A Gauss Rifle is a charging weapon.
A PPC is a heavy energy draw weapon.
In the case of a 2+ PPC - 1 Gauss equipped 'Mech, the following will happen:
While the Gauss Rifle charges, the pilot can only fire 1 of the PPCs. Choice is the pilots.
While the Gauss Rifle charges, the pilot cannot fire both PPCs simultaneously.
If the pilot decides to fire 1 PPC, there is a 0.5 second period in which the 2nd PPC cannot be fired.
In the case of a 2+ PPC - 2 Gauss equipped 'Mech, the following will happen:
If the pilot charges 2 Gauss Rifles, no PPCs will be able to fire.
This PPC lockdown effect lasts for 1 second after the Gauss Rifles have fired or auto-discharged.
We are in constant talks about this and MIGHT bring it on-line on the Public Test Server for you to provide feedback and thoughts on the mechanic.


One of the other solutions I've been looking at is slowing down the PPC projectile. What this gains is the ability of a target 'Mech to spread incoming damage more effectively by twisting its torso out of the line of fire. The number I've been toying with is 750m/s for PPCs and 850m/s ERPPCs(IS and Clan). Now if you're wondering what the current speed is, it is 1500m/s. So yes... that is a 50% decrease in projectile speed for PPCs.

What this translated into is that at 1000m, the PPC projectile hits its target just under 1 second after a simultaneously fired Gauss round. At 500m, it is around 1/4 of a second. Optimal target distance for the PPC/Gauss combo falls into the 600-700m range which allows enemy 'Mechs to close the gap a little easier vs PPC equipped 'Mechs. This also means that the PPC/AC20/AC10 combinations will be affected as well. A 50% decrease in projectile speed seems overly excessive but it really does bring the feel of the PPC/Gauss combo back into alignment with the rest of the game.

I'd like to, at this time, ask that you give your thoughts on these two solutions in the feedback thread for this post. Please keep in mind that the numbers listed in this post are testing values only and not the final, to be put into game numbers.

I understand that that both of these mechanics seem fairly heavy handed but it's time to bring this weapon combo into alignment with the other combinations of weapons.

Basically, it's either create a new convoluted and undocumented mechanic which we could dub "ghost cooldown", or to slow the PPC projectile down to old MechWarrior games level and make it a dodgeable weapon. I vote for the latter, time to break the PPC+AC5 combo too and give people more reasons to use less pinpointy weapons.

[satael]

So would the slowdown affect all ppcs and not just the ones paired with gauss? Given how great the mech lab is it's going to turn into another hidden feature that most players will not know about unless they venture deep into the cesspit known as mwo boards (not to say that any other games' official boards are much better). 

[Falconeer]

It would affect all PPCs. As I said, at the moment the PPC is still too good of a weapon all around. It's not that it needs a nerf, it just needs something to make it different from an Autocannon with infinite ammo.

A little cone-of-fire would be great, you know 

[satael]

I'd really like a cone of fire especially one that would be affected by movement (mostly to mess with the pop-tarts) but unfortunately they've chosen to go with a different design (I just think that stuff like multiple weapon alpha strikes would have been (more) easily fixed with adding a bit of extra scattering for simultaneous fire rather than the ghost heat system)