Video Games

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Sun May 06, 2018 12:10 pm

@Iduno
There should be a revert changes button somewhere, if i remember correctly.
Furthermore: Remodel your mechs. Take the PPC from the panther, put it on the shadow hawk. You should have access to at least one large laser by now, put that and 2 mediums into the panther and up armor and heatsink that sucker.

There was a smallish update to 1.0.2 but a larger one is panned, tentatively or however that is spelled, planned for june/july . .
Hopefully before the steam summer sale where i expect it to drop in price quite considerably . .

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Sun May 06, 2018 10:46 pm

Steam is being stupid.
I have, in my inventory, 2 Steam Coupons:
1 is for 66% off the Price of Ashes of the Singularity: Escalation which i already own. Good untill 12.05.2018
1 is for 25% off the Price of The Mage's Tale which i already own. Good untill 30.06.2018 GONE

edit:
disregard this, i have been told how to:

Anybody know wether or not i can gift those away so somebody can make use of them?

Pariah Dog · Post by **Pariah Dog** » Sun May 06, 2018 10:56 pm

It should say Tradeable if you can.

But if Battletech goes on as deep as a discount as you think I might pick it up during the Summer Sale.

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Sun May 06, 2018 11:32 pm

Well, it was only 30 bucks to start with, so i think it will get a 33% drop and go to about 20€ in the summer sale, whenever that may be. And if it gets the big patch untill then, i will probably rebuy it for myself as well . .

Iduno · Post by **Iduno** » Wed May 09, 2018 12:50 am

Stahlseele wrote:Well, it was only 30 bucks to start with, so i think it will get a 33% drop and go to about 20€ in the summer sale, whenever that may be. And if it gets the big patch untill then, i will probably rebuy it for myself as well . .

Ah, right. Steam is still pretty sure all currencies are equivalent (I assume they actually only both to adjust if they'll lose money). It's also on GoG, which might save you some money.

Also, yes: Shadowhawk became a 2K pretty quick, because my leader has the "single-weapon shots ignore defense" ability. I'm still disappointed they didn't make crits useful (no internals, no hilarious double-gyro TACs, and no slowing vehicles down). At least make a critted limb operate at -1 (+1? whichever is the bad one) or something.

Still, the mission generation, size modifiers to hit, and mechlab are better than MegaMek. On the other hand, MegaMek likes to start you low enough you can't buy replacement armor or weapons, gives you chase missions (both sides start in the same place, everyone gets torn up at close range, no tactics), then murder you with 4,000 vehicles. Player satisfaction might not be their thing.

As long as we're doing that thing, I've also got Super Mega Baseball 2 (15% off) and Mage's Tale (25%) coupons.

Whipstitch · Post by **Whipstitch** » Wed May 09, 2018 2:23 am

Yeah, crits don't really matter except on the handful of stock mech loadouts stupid enough to be packing ammunition within the center torso. It's kinda sad, really, since it means enemy shadowhawks occasionally randomly explode whereas your starter SHD is easily the most durable of your early mechs once you've relocated the ammo somewhere sensible.

Korwin · Post by **Korwin** » Wed May 09, 2018 8:10 am

DSMatticus wrote:Overheating pro tip: without frame caps, lowering settings does not decrease load, it only increases frames. The game will still use 100% of your GPU (or CPU). Vsync is the easiest way to frame cap a game, but vsync also tends to cause more input lag than a straight frame cap so I hate it.

Tried Vsync, sadly it did'nt do anything at all...

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Thu May 10, 2018 3:23 pm

https://www.polygon.com/2018/5/9/173353 ... ak-steamdb

Based on a screenshot shared on the Steam subreddit, 2018’s summer sale kicks off June 21 at 9:55 a.m. PT and runs until July 5 at 10:05 a.m. PT.

Whipstitch · Post by **Whipstitch** » Fri May 11, 2018 5:56 pm

I wonder if I would have more sympathy for the people who keep bitching about Battletech's difficulty if I hadn't beaten the first pirate moon mission and then immediately looted a complete jagermech via assassination on the next contract. Funniest part is just how easy it was--stock jagermechs are notoriously under armored and it had that bad maintenance armor debuff so common to early missions so its legs turned to confetti the second I pointed a couple PPCs at it.

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Fri May 11, 2018 6:32 pm

looting a jaegermech early on is such a boost to your actual capabilities . .

Whipstitch · Post by **Whipstitch** » Fri May 11, 2018 7:18 pm

The nicest thing about it is the snowball effect it's had on my salvage. The JM6-S isn't literally the perfect 'mech but it might as well be given that pointing 20+ tons of autocannon at somebody's legs is the Battletech equivalent of throwing a pokeball.

Zaranthan · Post by **Zaranthan** » Fri May 11, 2018 8:01 pm

I thought blowing the legs off only gave you two pieces of salvage? If you want all three you have to KO the pilot without coreing the mech?

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Fri May 11, 2018 8:12 pm

Technically, you need the head, the center, one leg and one arm for 3 parts of salvage/a complete mech, according to reddit threads about this . .

But yes, if you can work the blowjob starter mech, then the jaeger is basically getting a deepthroat upgrade.

Whipstitch · Post by **Whipstitch** » Fri May 11, 2018 8:57 pm

The big thing is that routinely getting 2/3rds of a mech is nothing to sneeze at since all those extra bits lying around appears to make the game more inclined to throw you a bone by giving you a piece or two beyond what you personally claim. Those Assassination missions where a 2nd lance ambushes you partway through the map are basically pinatas.

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Sat May 12, 2018 12:37 am

Also:
mech salvage sells for very good monies . . several hundred thousand credits per part if i am not mistaken . . .

Pariah Dog · Post by **Pariah Dog** » Sat May 12, 2018 1:11 am

So barring any patchery the tactic you recommend is to go around kneecapping Mechs like Arnold in T2?

Whipstitch · Post by **Whipstitch** » Sat May 12, 2018 3:19 am

For maximizing salvage in routine play, yeah, definitely--pure headhunting often isn't very practical without save scumming and Called Shot Mastery (a VERY high rank skill) whereas just kneecapping dudes is reasonably effective from day 1.

The big thing to understand is that to get a called shot on a specific area you either need to be spending Morale Points on Precise Shots or you need to be firing upon a downed opponent. So legging with Precise Shot is viable because it scores a knockdown which then leads to the rest of your lance running a train on the bits of your choice. Plus, the mech core is virtually always the most heavily armored part of a mech while the cockpit is the hardest to hit even with called shots. So depending on how the location rolls go sometimes going for the legs is just legit faster than trying to core them out anyway, which is a pretty important consideration when there's AC/10s pointed in your direction.

CapnTthePirateG · Post by **CapnTthePirateG** » Sat May 12, 2018 5:42 am

The LRM storm is amazing for knocking down mechs. Get a mech whose sole purpose is LRM spam and watch people go down!

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Sat May 12, 2018 11:10 am

Oh yes, legging Mechs has been the go to tactic since MW1 . .
And LRM Storming has been the cheesing thing since MWLL/MWO/MW-Tactics, where they made LRMs much much more dangerous than they are in the CBT Boardgame . .

Whipstitch · Post by **Whipstitch** » Sat May 12, 2018 4:15 pm

Yeah, LRMs and to a lesser extent SRMs can get pretty OP right now. At first it's teeny bit hard to notice since you don't really have the hardpoints to take advantage of unadulterated missile boating in the early game, but the most egregious bit is that premium manufacturer damage bonuses are doled out per projectile in this game rather than per volley and the scaling gets out of hand. And since the whole point of LRM 20s is to be roughly equivalent to multiple weapon systems placed within a single hardpoint you don't have to find many Zeus & Telos brand 20s to justify going full Macross.

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Sat May 12, 2018 5:02 pm

And then there are the +,++ and +++ weaponsystems.
And on the enemy side you have:
LRM-Carrier:3xLRM20.
SRM-Carrier: 10xSRM6.
Yes, that is 60 missles coming your way.
In the case of LRM-Carriers with a spotter from nowhere you can see or shoot at.
Catapults will be horribly effective machines . .

Whipstitch · Post by **Whipstitch** » Sat May 12, 2018 6:14 pm

Yeah, the +++ weapons are what I was talking about with the brands. Every Zeus system has some number of pluses attached and they're hella OP because a Zeus LRM20+++ will knock you right on your ass.

Anyway, I think my biggest complaint about Battletech right now is all the whinging over how the only way to play is with Bulwark turtling because otherwise you could be randomly felled by an AC/20 at any moment. I mean, look, I get it: Bulwark turtling is probably too effective relative to the effort it takes and thinking can be hard. But seriously bruh, an AC/20 can't even shoot a quarter mile. If you can't figure out how to mobility tactics are inherently strong against AC/20s then I don't know what to say.

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Sat May 12, 2018 8:08 pm

Yeah, but the to hit numbers are insane in this game as well . .
I am not sure how familiar you are with it, but emember that in the CBT Boardgame, you have 2D6 to roll your shots etc.
And your TN to Hit increases in certain hex-ranges.
An AC20 is supposed to be a point blank weapon.
Hits at 9 hexes (270m) are about as rare as birdteeth.
Granted, they do happen, but the base TN to hit with the average 4 shooting skill pilot is 10. If the target moved more than 5 hexes, your TN is now 13 and thus already impossible. Same with SRMs actually.
Seeing all those 80/90% to hit chances at basically max range for these weapons is insanely bad game balance. Especially since there happens to be one of the most feared mechs in the universe. The Hunchback. 50t Mech with one AC20 and 2 Medium Lasers and enough Armor and speed to get up close and personal easy and surive getting off some shots.
And in this game that means one of them has the capability to actually take out your entire lance, if you do not run away as fast as possible and simultaneously maange to focus fire him down to get him out of the fight.
The LRM-SPAM? Same Problem. in the CBT Board-Game, LRM have a sweet spot of 6/7 hexes firing range. Closer and you increase TN per hex under because of minimum range, and at 8 hexes distance, you already increase by 2 again because you go from short to medium range for them . .

This game is ridiculously lethal with the increased to hit and the evasion and stability damage as it is.

In the Board-Game, there is no such thing as evasion, just an increase to the enemy TN by your movement, and that can not be negated . .
In this game it can be completely negated EVEN BY MISSING SHOTS AT THE MECH for some reason.

In the Board Game, you have to make a piloting roll with the base TN being your pilot skill to remain standing after having taken 20DMG. Which is one AC20 hit. And the TN increases by 1 for every 20 points of damage after the first. So 40 pts of DMG and you need to roll your Pilot Skill+1 etc.
I have no idea how the stability damage mechanic works in this excactly, but you see mechs fall way more often than in the board game as well . .
In the Board-Game, the type of weapon that hit you does not matter in terms of if you keel over or not.
Just wether or not it goes above 20 pts of dmg or does something else to make you roll for falling over, like ripping a leg clean off . .

Of course i agree with you that "Do not let the AC20 come close enough! DUH!" is something simple most people should understand . .
But it is way harder in this game than it is in the board game.
And if it gets into range, the effects of that are also way worse . .

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Sat May 12, 2018 8:27 pm

Stahlseele wrote:Seeing all those 80/90% to hit chances at basically max range for these weapons is insanely bad game balance.

I can understand why you would increase the typical use accuracy to 70%-85%. Doing everything right and still consistently missing shots is a really frustrating and pointless way to slow the game down. It's tedious in videogames and it's doubly so in tabletop where computers aren't already speeding everything up. But obviously if you're going to increase accuracy, you're also going to have to tinker with ranges/mobility/map size to maintain the existing weapon roles.

I, of course, know nothing of the Battletech boardgame or videogame. Just a general observation.

Whipstitch · Post by **Whipstitch** » Sat May 12, 2018 8:31 pm

Thing is, the stability mechanic smokes people whether they're dodging or bracing and goes well beyond the Bulwark vs Evasion issue. Stock LRM boats are already scary effective and the Zeus LRMs do double stability for some dumb ass reason. Mechs need to jump jet AND brace for impact to have any real hope of coping with that and if it's focus fire from multiple mechs you're basically just fucked.