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JacksLibido posted:That's just retarded though. At that point why don't you just make everybody walk around with stability damage if 1-2 missiles will do 80% of the stability damage 20 will? That's just flat dumb. I tried to think of what you could mean that wasn't stupid, but if it really is that then dude, no. You've posted nothing but irrational poo poo-talk about basically everything so far, I'm not particularly inclined to argue it out with you. Think what you like, it was merely a recommendation for a way they could address people's concerns about overall stability damage from missiles.
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# ? Jun 4, 2017 23:33 |
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# ? Apr 29, 2024 16:29 |
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Zaodai posted:You've posted nothing but irrational poo poo-talk about basically everything so far, I'm not particularly inclined to argue it out with you. Think what you like, it was merely a recommendation for a way they could address people's concerns about overall stability damage from missiles. Lurms do damage too, so bringing more is its own reward. Stability damage is a bonus, scaling it down a bit makes sense.
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# ? Jun 4, 2017 23:46 |
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I've unironically been putting multitarget on Orions and it has been pretty nice to launch volleys of LRM's to far targets while still blatting the upclose targets w/everything else. It's not unusual to designiate it's LRM's and my LRM boats to just keep something like an awesome on it's butt for the entire match. If evasion gets nerfed for assaults it would probably turn into a decent choice for the Atlas as well.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 01:10 |
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I could also see the King Crab being a great fit for Multi-targeting. But then again, the thing is a great fit for anything except Sensor Lock.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 01:17 |
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Really love the game, but the AI is not up to snuff. In 10 games I have lost 2 mechs and that was from me being silly trying to get an Urbie to DFA an Atlas. Some things that stand out. Enemy mechs really spread out and walking into my killbox one at a time over 4 or 5 turns An enemy Atlas trying to kill an Urbie at long range for 3 turns while my Atlas is standing one hex behind the enemy Atlas blasting away for 3 turns.. Game is good just want a challenge from the AI
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 01:17 |
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AI needs a little tweaking but this is, after all, literally beta. Not in the "ooh we'll give you BETA access THREE WEEKS in advance so you can get a head start", in the "no this game is still a bit broken and we want legitimate feedback" sense, which is refreshing.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 01:21 |
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Yeah, I don't think anyone is saying they are disappointed the AI isn't top-notch, just that yeah, it needs quite a bit of work.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 01:35 |
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My sense of the AI's issue is that it doesn't really know how to operate a lance as a single unit. It can do the smart thing with any given single mech, but it won't (for instance) try to keep its lance together to provide support for each other. Make sure you fill out the response survey when you get the AI page. Our priorities between now and launch for the combat game are going to be largely driven by the survey results.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 02:23 |
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isildur posted:My sense of the AI's issue is that it doesn't really know how to operate a lance as a single unit. It can do the smart thing with any given single mech, but it won't (for instance) try to keep its lance together to provide support for each other. Oh thats nice to know, I mean the game itself is fun but there is definitely all those little niggling quality of life issues like that. Is there any key words I can put in to go 'hey have this do this' or attach a link to PTN's very nice screenshot for adding the potential status effects a mech you're shooting at might have? Other than ones listed here the only big thing I find annoying is when you a picking a mech for skirmish I want to just have a list of weapons on a mech underneath the description to show what im grabbing (preferably with a location name in brackets next to it e.g. Medium Laser (LT))
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 02:29 |
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isildur posted:My sense of the AI's issue is that it doesn't really know how to operate a lance as a single unit. It can do the smart thing with any given single mech, but it won't (for instance) try to keep its lance together to provide support for each other. No worries, I've been filling them out like crazy and putting a paragraph or so in the notes section. Loving how you guys are approaching that.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 02:38 |
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isildur posted:My sense of the AI's issue is that it doesn't really know how to operate a lance as a single unit. It can do the smart thing with any given single mech, but it won't (for instance) try to keep its lance together to provide support for each other. This is what I think also. Sending in units unsupported, not piling in when contact is made - each unit tends to be okay in a vacuum but they don't have a good way of working with one another, so it's too easy to string them out and roll them up 4v1 or 4v2 at a time. Is there a way to debug disable fog of war? Because I can't see through the fog of war, but it feels like the AI likes to start every match by sprint moving all 4 units straight ahead which naturally spreads out the units into a chain based on movespeed. I wonder if the AI doing well with Urbanmechs (anecdotally, it feels like they do) is because they're slower than Locusts or Commandos so they can't get out as far ahead from their support? Psion fucked around with this message at 03:03 on Jun 5, 2017 |
# ? Jun 5, 2017 03:00 |
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Psion posted:This is what I think also. Sending in units unsupported, not piling in when contact is made - each unit tends to be okay in a vacuum but they don't have a good way of working with one another, so it's too easy to string them out and roll them up 4v1 or 4v2 at a time. The AI is literally making me fear UrbanMechs, just because they hang out near the back and every single shot seems to go into my center torso. I feel like they're calling shots every time they fire. It's probably that the lances are putting high-gunnery guys into the UrbanMechs, but good god I understand them now.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 03:28 |
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All this 'I'm not losing enough mechs' chat actually raises an important point for the campaign: what amount of attrition does everyone think the player should be experiencing on the average mission? Because I'm coming from an XCOM perspective where the metric is 'if the player does everything right, a bad roll might lose you a guy but really you should expect to clown the AI by making the right choices'. Obviously Battletech is a game based around managing damage attrition rather than avoiding damage entirely, but isn't the ideal outcome of a game well played one where all your mechs have taken some damage but are still standing?
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 12:35 |
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I just played a skirmish where almost all of my Mechs got beat up pretty good. I have a Trebuchet missing an arm and a Locust missing both arms. I'd say that's a good baseline for a "tough mission that went well" in the campaign.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 12:48 |
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The nice thing about Battletech versus X-COM is that damage is much more gradual, so you can realistically field partially repaired mechs who might only have armor damage. This would also make the campaign interesting from a choices perspective; do you allocate your techs to fixing up that salvaged heavy mech or do you have them focus on repairing the armor on your line mechs who have to go out next mission?
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 14:05 |
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PoptartsNinja posted:
Late to the party but I like this. I also agree that the final hit percentage should probably include any evasion modifiers. If you want to be a little more explicit so that people aren't going "Why does my Gunnery 8 pilot only have 30% to hit, something is broken!!!", you could have the base hit before evade and after shown beside the weapons as well. That, combined with the icons like in this image would do an excellent job at showing both what the actual hit chance is, and why it is what it is (which is honestly the most important bit, players not getting why it's lower will feel cheated or that it's not working right). That could even be dynamic, so that if you select down to 1 weapon then Precision Strike or any similar abilities would have a sudden bump in displayed accuracy, showing how much of a bonus they are (which would help us in testing the game and giving feedback as well)!
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 14:25 |
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Alchenar posted:isn't the ideal outcome of a game well played one where all your mechs have taken some damage but are still standing? Assuming smart play, I think it's going to be possible to get all 4 mechs making it out, most times, but there will likely be mech writeoffs aside from "I just got this new Orion" ... I dunno. I hope the ideal outcome is a little more abstracted into "making a profit" because it might be worth trading a mech for an objective that'll get you more cbills than if you'd desperately tried to save a heavily damaged whatever. Since you're pointing out the XCOM perspective, in that game it's possible to avoid taking a single hit so you can run an entire campaign with your starting soldiers if you know the game well enough. I hope that's not the case here, it doesn't really fit. Psion fucked around with this message at 16:30 on Jun 5, 2017 |
# ? Jun 5, 2017 16:23 |
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I would say that your expected losses should be somewhat in line with the difficulty of mission you take (and hopefully payout you receive, unless you took a sucker's mission). If you're out taking cakewalk missions and running garrison duty, maybe there's not much risk. If you're on one side or the other of a planetary assault, maybe losing 2 mechs is considered breaking even. A lot of this changes when put in to context of a persistent world, which is what makes it so interesting to me.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 16:29 |
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Zaodai posted:A lot of this changes when put in to context of a persistent world, which is what makes it so interesting to me. Yeah, exactly. How much is a lead on a Star League cache of tech worth to you over sacrificing your previously pristine Orion? That kinda thing makes 'ideal' a lot more interesting of a question.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 16:31 |
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Psion posted:Yeah, exactly. How much is a lead on a Star League cache of tech worth to you over sacrificing your previously pristine Orion? That kinda thing makes 'ideal' a lot more interesting of a question. And some of it may not even be monetary value vs current value. How much are your friends worth? Are you going to face down that assault lance to buy time for the guys who employed you for the last 4 missions to escape, or are you going to leave them to die, or even switch sides because it's an easy pay day? Of course then your rep will be poo poo because you bailed, but hey, you're not dead.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 16:34 |
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Zaodai posted:And some of it may not even be monetary value vs current value. How much are your friends worth? Are you going to face down that assault lance to buy time for the guys who employed you for the last 4 missions to escape, or are you going to leave them to die, or even switch sides because it's an easy pay day? Of course then your rep will be poo poo because you bailed, but hey, you're not dead.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 16:37 |
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Psion posted:Assuming smart play, I think it's going to be possible to get all 4 mechs making it out, most times, but there will likely be mech writeoffs aside from "I just got this new Orion" ... I dunno. I hope the ideal outcome is a little more abstracted into "making a profit" because it might be worth trading a mech for an objective that'll get you more cbills than if you'd desperately tried to save a heavily damaged whatever. Coming in from both XCOM and Battle Brothers, the level up system ensures that meat is extremely valuable in both games. Losing a single high-level soldier in a "successful" mission can set you back several missions of gains and grinding. Hopefully, this game will either make it easier to lose mechs without losing pilots, or make pilots much more replaceable. Losing single mech should not turn a victory into a pyrrhic win unless that mech has los-tech on it or the pilot is like Natasha Kerensky or something. golden bubble fucked around with this message at 16:55 on Jun 5, 2017 |
# ? Jun 5, 2017 16:53 |
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I really don't think the XCOM comparisons are of much use. THey're two fundamentally different games. The only similarities are that they are tactical strategy games with a campaign overlay. XCOM is based around a cover system that, if used well, allows you to kill poo poo while taking minimal damage in return. BT (both board game and this game) is much more about positioning and movement. Without as strong a cover mechanic as XCOM you are far, far more reliant on position to ensure you deal more damage than you take. Direction is also irrelevant in XCOM - getting shot in the back is essentially the same as getting shot from the front and the main reason to flank is to nullify cover bonuses - while the difference between front and rear in BT is profound. Classes are also more strongly differentiated in BT as well as more granular. A sniper is different from a heavy gunner in XCOM, but not to quite the extent that a heavy assault like an Atlas is different than a light like a locust. At the same time within those broad classes there is more differentiation - a locust and an urban mech are technically in the same weight class but play vastly different rolls. Ultimately the real test is to ask yourself if you modded vanilla XCOM with BT models and changed the cover to be terrain whether it would feel like BT, and the answer is not really. XCOM is a fine game and an absolute master class in effective design, both in terms of style and mechanics, but it's not the purest, most perfect form of tactical strategy game that all others must answer to. edit: I mean, I get the comparisons, especially given HBS's other projects. A direct (and somewhat unfavorable) comparison can be drawn to XCOM and the tactical level of Shadowrun. This project is just so different on multiple levels that I really don't think it becomes a useful point of comparison. edit 2: this wasn't a response to the above, by the way. On the level of resource management there is a lot more to discuss. I'm more thinking of the conversations from before about looking at XCOM's tactical layer and what we've seen of BT so far.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:01 |
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Spare mechs are going to be something you will accumulate, I believe. I don't know how spare pilots work. I also don't know if there will be 'noncombat' roles you can assign a pilot to, letting you get some use out of them if they're too beat up to risk in combat or if you just say "well see ya" and shove them back in the general direction of Mercenary's Star.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:04 |
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golden bubble posted:Coming in from both XCOM and Battle Brothers, the level up system ensures that meat is extremely valuable in both games. Losing a single high-level soldier in a "successful" mission can set you back several missions of gains and grinding. Hopefully, this game will either make it easier to lose mechs without losing pilots, or make pilots much more replaceable. Losing single mech should not turn a victory into a pyrrhic win unless that mech has los-tech on it or the pilot is like Natasha Kerensky or something. It all depends on how hard it is to get those pilot abilities, and how OP they are. e.g. If Evasion stays in the game as-is, and it takes many missions to grind a pilot up to getting Evasion, the pilot is worth far more than the mech is. Which is basically the opposite of the original Battletech lore: Where life is cheap and mechs are expensive.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:04 |
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So XCOM and Battletech are at diametric opposite ends of 'how does a turn based tactical game work'. I raised the comparison because XCOM has a fairly well developed sense of how much 'risk' the player is subjected to every battle. You might suffer no injuries at all in a fight, or you might lose two people to insanely unlucky crits. But it all averages out so that a good player can reasonably expect to progress through the campaign and not hit a fail-state. That's relevant because Battletech needs to find that same balance, which is harder because it's based around the player suffering a certain amount of damage across all their mechs each battle and yet still coming out ahead.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:07 |
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Cyrano4747 posted:I really don't think the XCOM comparisons are of much use. THey're two fundamentally different games. The only similarities are that they are tactical strategy games with a campaign overlay. XCOM is based around a cover system that, if used well, allows you to kill poo poo while taking minimal damage in return. BT (both board game and this game) is much more about positioning and movement. Without as strong a cover mechanic as XCOM you are far, far more reliant on position to ensure you deal more damage than you take. Direction is also irrelevant in XCOM - getting shot in the back is essentially the same as getting shot from the front and the main reason to flank is to nullify cover bonuses - while the difference between front and rear in BT is profound. Classes are also more strongly differentiated in BT as well as more granular. A sniper is different from a heavy gunner in XCOM, but not to quite the extent that a heavy assault like an Atlas is different than a light like a locust. At the same time within those broad classes there is more differentiation - a locust and an urban mech are technically in the same weight class but play vastly different rolls. Well as an additional point, let me list all the ways I feel Battletech - the video game imitates Xcom - the game. Battletech's combat system is Xcom 2 with Mechs, and has the flavor of Battletech mechanics wherever an equivalent could be provided. Move and shoot system? Ah, btech has Sprint, even though it was a maxtech optional rule that just about nobody used - it's ok. The hit percentages are xcom style. The positioning and aim cones are xcom style and torso turning has been abstracted. The paperdolls have no damage indicators or visiable armor display. Why? Because Xcom soldiers don't have damage values, they just have hitpoints - there is no locational damage in Xcom. So, when using Xcom for "inspiration" that part didn't get included - since Xcom doesn't have it. The scale is wrong, because the designers were using Xcom as a reference point, which is soldiers and not robots. 4 mech start point. Why? Because that's what you get in Xcom to start. Why balance by weight and have flexible squad sizes? Deterministic Soldier Skills - guess what, people loved these in Xcom! AI roles named after Xcom soldier classes - a mech has to decide who is the sniper. I know this may seem, dumb but actually Sniper is not really a battletech concept. So having someone with Sniper like functionality - lights give you LOS, just like someone would do for a sniper in Xcom. And the LOS mechanics work off the same concept. The list goes on and on. Shadowrun was "Xcom, but in CYBER SPACE", and this is "Xcom, but with ROBOTS" It's ok but I feel pretty ripped off for the $60 that I backed a fairly low risk project. I am glad others are happy, but I sure didn't want "HBS makes another Xcom clone, hope this one sells 5 million guys, this will be the one" Ham Sandwiches fucked around with this message at 17:11 on Jun 5, 2017 |
# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:09 |
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The only failure state is bankruptcy, so presumably replacements are, at heart, just a matter of c-bills. e: Ham Sandwiches posted:
because 4 mechs hasn't been a standard IS lance size since BT was created or anything Hey, what do you think about ECM...just asking e: Ham Sandwiches posted:
Psion fucked around with this message at 17:19 on Jun 5, 2017 |
# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:10 |
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Ham Sandwiches posted:Well as a counterpoint, let me list all the ways I feel Battletech resembles Xcom. By that logic any turn based tactical game with multiple movement modes is XCOM.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:11 |
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Cyrano4747 posted:By that logic any turn based tactical game with multiple movement modes is XCOM. And by that logic any clone of any other game was simply inspired by it. There's shades and degrees, and the Btech combat system is far too close to Xcom's combat system for my taste. I was ok with 0-40% xcom, this feels like 60-80% xcom, that's more Xcom that I wanted in my mulligatawny.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:12 |
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Cyrano4747 posted:By that logic any turn based tactical game with multiple movement modes is XCOM. All FPS games are Wolf3D unless they came out after Goldeneye, in which case they're Goldeneye. It's a fact!
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:14 |
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Oh yeah, really dumb headshot rate because someone wants you to go
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:14 |
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I honestly can't tell if the "Battletech is just XCOM2 with mechs" post is tongue in cheek or not. I really hope it is. Or it's a quote from the official forums.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:17 |
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Ham Sandwiches posted:
Also 4 mech lances has been an integral part of BT since the 80s. edit: Ham Sandwiches posted:Oh yeah, really dumb headshot rate because someone wants you to go So was this. TT you have a 1 in 12 chance of shooting a mech in the face every roll. Watching your assault get blow away by an AC20 to the dome is about as core BT as it gets.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:17 |
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Ham Sandwiches posted:Well as an additional point, let me list all the ways I feel Battletech - the video game imitates Xcom - the game. I don't know which game you're playing, but it certainly isn't the same one I am.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:18 |
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The LOS argument is also really stupid as that was kind of one of the huuuuge things with LRMs in TT as well. Was I playing XCOM in mom's basement in middleschool? edit: well, actually I was, but on the computer after my friends went home and I put away the minis.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:20 |
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Cyrano4747 posted:Also 4 mech lances has been an integral part of BT since the 80s. The option was there to make the campaign start with less, ala crescent hawk's inception or the mech commander games. I believe they started with 4 since that's what Xcom starts with. quote:So was this. TT you have a 1 in 12 chance of shooting a mech in the face every roll. Watching your assault get blow away by an AC20 to the dome is about as core BT as it gets. Yes but the number of 10 point 1 in 12 weapons was very low, I have a feeling when the damage values got increased something got screwed up with head hits and frequency / lethality. The intended purpose seems to be to force you to lose pilots, even when playing conservatively. If that's the case then it's being put in for purposes. Incidentally, the multiple initiative system was not in Xcom and I want to give HBS credit for making something worse. Now a slow boring turn in btech has 5 subturns, so really 1 turn = 5, it's really amazing they found a way to slow down the overall flow of the rounds but that one is absolutely their own innovation.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:22 |
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Ham Sandwiches posted:The option was there to make the campaign start with less, ala crescent hawk's inception or the mech commander games. I believe they started with 4 since that's what Xcom starts with. Please, tell me more about how the campaign that we haven't seen yet is going to start.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:22 |
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Well Zaodai I think we answered your question, but it's not the answer we wanted!
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:23 |
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# ? Apr 29, 2024 16:29 |
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Psion posted:Well Zaodai I think we answered your question, but it's not the answer we wanted! Lol you guys pulled this same stuff like a year ago when I posted, at some point it's gonna be hard to keep being outraged that 1 dude on the internet doesn't like the design they went with. And maybe it can be a civil thing without huge meltdowns or brown sea posts or source your quotes or allllll the usual stuff I spent my $60, I played the beta, I wasn't impressed, and I made 1 post about it for my poor dead btech game.
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# ? Jun 5, 2017 17:26 |