3.1 Feedback

[khshea]

This is copied and pasted from the original document, with my comments added in red.

1) Are there enough entertaining ways to win? I think so, yes.
2) Is the Tactics Phase and the variable order of the other phases something that adds to the game? Is it an interesting mechanic, and more importantly does it actually make the game different than if the phases were all in the same order every time? The tactics phase adds a degree of tactical variability and control that is missing from many games, I think.
3) Is the game balanced? Do the rules provide for a wide variety of mech designs and mech sizes while giving them all a more or less equal shot at winning? If not, where does the problem lie? Is some particular weapon too powerful? Do some rules favor small mechs or large mechs unfairly?
4) Are there any choices in mech design or combat that are “no-brainers”? Are any choices in the game so advantageous in multiple situations that an experienced player would be stupid not to choose them?
5) The other side of the question number 3 coin: Are there any choices that no one ever takes because they’re useless? The Portal Master seems nigh useless, I’d say.
6) Are there things not included in the game that should be? Is there a particular tactic you’d like to use that there aren’t rules for? Are there things you wish your mech/weapon/crew member could do that aren’t covered by any existing gadgets/enchantments/special abilities?



MOVEMENT PHASE
To turn, a mech must first change its facing. Turning a mech one hex side requires one move, so a mech must therefore have Speed available to change its facing. A mech is limited in the number of times it can change its facing in one phase by its Maneuver statistic. A mech with a Maneuver of 2 could only change facing twice each Movement Phase regardless of how much Speed it has. In most cases, a mech’s Speed and Maneuver are determined by its Source.

I may still be confused about Maneuver. As long as my mech has the speed to cover it, I can rotate my mech 360 degrees (6 hex faces) and only use 1 point of maneuver? To me, the number of faces changed =/= the number of times one’s facing is changed – these are two separate ideas. I read the rules as written to mean that if I have a mech with a speed of 18 and a maneuverability of 2, I could go forward 2 hexes, rotate 180 degrees (3 points of speed, 1 point of maneuver), go forward another 2 hexes, rotate 360 degrees (6 points of speed, 1 point of maneuver), and still have 5 points of speed left with which to move.

Even the example below does not make it clear if this is the case or not.

Example: The Battleaxe is a mech with Speed 6 and Maneuver 2. In the Movement phase, it could move 6 hexes in a straight line. It could also move 1 hex, rotate 1 hex side to the left, move 2 more hexes, rotate 1 hex side to the right, and move 1 hex forward.





CRITICAL HITS
A mech with a red critical arm suffers a total damage reduction of 3, and an accuracy penalty of 4. <--This math appears to be off. Given that a red crit reduces damage by 50%, without stating what the mech’s initial damage is, how can you determine what the red crit reduces it to? The penalty cannot be determined without the original damage amount.




MAMMOTH WITH CANNONS <--AWESOME




From the Mech Design section
Call me dumb, but I don’t see where a weapon’s size is specified/explained. If Size = Damage, then I think only one term should be used, not two.




Looking at the Sample Mechs
At a glance, Armor seems to be overused/overvalued. One Headsman versus any number of 100 pt or smaller mechs looks like it is going to be virtually indestructible, or at the very least, take an eternity to defeat. Escalating the Armor AND the Structure I think causes point values to be skewed, so my recommendation is to limit or scale down one or the other, Armor or Structure (preferably Armor). If the goal is to have equivalency in pointage between mechs equal equivalency in power, you need go no further than pitting two Talons and a Frostbite against one Headsman to see that the current system does not accommodate that. Such a fight would be a total mismatch because the Talons and Frostbite barely have a chance of damaging the Headsman, and when they could do damage, they’d need to do so much of it that they wouldn’t be able to endure any counteroffensive from the Headsman. I’d say that you could even have 4 Talons and 2 Frostbites, and it still wouldn’t be a challenge for the Headsman. Cut the Armor stats in half for all the mechs, and the little guys stand a chance.

If the response to this would be that most victories are earned via crits, and getting the enemy mech's internal systems into the black, then I would point out that this seems to make Structure unnecessary.




Other than these things which could use some tweaking or re-wording, I see no particular problems with the system, and nothing that seems outright broken. Also, did I mention that mammoths with cannons sound awesome?

And I haven't had the opportunity yet to read through everyone else's recent posts, so if I'm repeating something, or if I'm bringing up something that's already been addressed or acknowledged, my apologies.

[walrusjester]

I kinda like Portal Master - it doesn't work that often, but when it does it can reshape the entire map. But if folks think it's not worth much, we can replace it.

I may still be confused about Maneuver. As long as my mech has the speed to cover it, I can rotate my mech 360 degrees (6 hex faces) and only use 1 point of maneuver? To me, the number of faces changed =/= the number of times one’s facing is changed – these are two separate ideas. I read the rules as written to mean that if I have a mech with a speed of 18 and a maneuverability of 2, I could go forward 2 hexes, rotate 180 degrees (3 points of speed, 1 point of maneuver), go forward another 2 hexes, rotate 360 degrees (6 points of speed, 1 point of maneuver), and still have 5 points of speed left with which to move.

Even the example below does not make it clear if this is the case or not.

Example: The Battleaxe is a mech with Speed 6 and Maneuver 2. In the Movement phase, it could move 6 hexes in a straight line. It could also move 1 hex, rotate 1 hex side to the left, move 2 more hexes, rotate 1 hex side to the right, and move 1 hex forward.

The intent of Maneuver is that 1 point of it lets you rotate to 1 adjacent facing - your Spd 18 Man 2 mech could only move 120 degrees total from its original facing. The idea of using Maneuver instead as "number of times you can change facing" is an interesting one.

CRITICAL HITS
A mech with a red critical arm suffers a total damage reduction of 3, and an accuracy penalty of 4. <--This math appears to be off. Given that a red crit reduces damage by 50%, without stating what the mech’s initial damage is, how can you determine what the red crit reduces it to? The penalty cannot be determined without the original damage amount.

Fair point. We'll try to clarify that.

MAMMOTH WITH CANNONS <--AWESOME

Word.

From the Mech Design section
Call me dumb, but I don’t see where a weapon’s size is specified/explained. If Size = Damage, then I think only one term should be used, not two.

You have a point. We'll try to clarify that too.

Looking at the Sample Mechs
At a glance, Armor seems to be overused/overvalued. One Headsman versus any number of 100 pt or smaller mechs looks like it is going to be virtually indestructible, or at the very least, take an eternity to defeat. Escalating the Armor AND the Structure I think causes point values to be skewed, so my recommendation is to limit or scale down one or the other, Armor or Structure (preferably Armor). If the goal is to have equivalency in pointage between mechs equal equivalency in power, you need go no further than pitting two Talons and a Frostbite against one Headsman to see that the current system does not accommodate that. Such a fight would be a total mismatch because the Talons and Frostbite barely have a chance of damaging the Headsman, and when they could do damage, they’d need to do so much of it that they wouldn’t be able to endure any counteroffensive from the Headsman. I’d say that you could even have 4 Talons and 2 Frostbites, and it still wouldn’t be a challenge for the Headsman. Cut the Armor stats in half for all the mechs, and the little guys stand a chance.

If the response to this would be that most victories are earned via crits, and getting the enemy mech's internal systems into the black, then I would point out that this seems to make Structure unnecessary.

This version of the game makes substantial changes to Structure, crits, and Armor. Ideally we want Structure loss and critical its to both be viable ways of taking down an enemy mech. Trouble is, it's hard to know precisely how it works without extensive testing. The more that people can test combat and see how it goes, the more we can refine it. So we encourage everyone to not just read the rules - which is helpful, no doubt about it - but also to play games. Even your solitary mech-vs-mech battle generates data that helps us a lot.

[khshea]

It's not that I don't think Portal Master is cool -- it is. It's just that, given the rarity of success, I doubt that I'd ever build a mech that has it.

I kinda like Portal Master - it doesn't work that often, but when it does it can reshape the entire map. But if folks think it's not worth much, we can replace it.

I may still be confused about Maneuver. As long as my mech has the speed to cover it, I can rotate my mech 360 degrees (6 hex faces) and only use 1 point of maneuver? To me, the number of faces changed =/= the number of times one’s facing is changed – these are two separate ideas. I read the rules as written to mean that if I have a mech with a speed of 18 and a maneuverability of 2, I could go forward 2 hexes, rotate 180 degrees (3 points of speed, 1 point of maneuver), go forward another 2 hexes, rotate 360 degrees (6 points of speed, 1 point of maneuver), and still have 5 points of speed left with which to move.

Even the example below does not make it clear if this is the case or not.

Example: The Battleaxe is a mech with Speed 6 and Maneuver 2. In the Movement phase, it could move 6 hexes in a straight line. It could also move 1 hex, rotate 1 hex side to the left, move 2 more hexes, rotate 1 hex side to the right, and move 1 hex forward.

The intent of Maneuver is that 1 point of it lets you rotate to 1 adjacent facing - your Spd 18 Man 2 mech could only move 120 degrees total from its original facing. The idea of using Maneuver instead as "number of times you can change facing" is an interesting one.

OK, then I'm not misunderstanding it, but I am of the opinion that the rules are still not clear. To me, changing one's facing one "time" does not equal changing one's facing by one hex side, and unless the rules made it clear otherwise, this is how I would play the game.

CRITICAL HITS
A mech with a red critical arm suffers a total damage reduction of 3, and an accuracy penalty of 4. <--This math appears to be off. Given that a red crit reduces damage by 50%, without stating what the mech’s initial damage is, how can you determine what the red crit reduces it to? The penalty cannot be determined without the original damage amount.

Fair point. We'll try to clarify that.

MAMMOTH WITH CANNONS <--AWESOME

Word.

From the Mech Design section
Call me dumb, but I don’t see where a weapon’s size is specified/explained. If Size = Damage, then I think only one term should be used, not two.

You have a point. We'll try to clarify that too.

Looking at the Sample Mechs
At a glance, Armor seems to be overused/overvalued. One Headsman versus any number of 100 pt or smaller mechs looks like it is going to be virtually indestructible, or at the very least, take an eternity to defeat. Escalating the Armor AND the Structure I think causes point values to be skewed, so my recommendation is to limit or scale down one or the other, Armor or Structure (preferably Armor). If the goal is to have equivalency in pointage between mechs equal equivalency in power, you need go no further than pitting two Talons and a Frostbite against one Headsman to see that the current system does not accommodate that. Such a fight would be a total mismatch because the Talons and Frostbite barely have a chance of damaging the Headsman, and when they could do damage, they’d need to do so much of it that they wouldn’t be able to endure any counteroffensive from the Headsman. I’d say that you could even have 4 Talons and 2 Frostbites, and it still wouldn’t be a challenge for the Headsman. Cut the Armor stats in half for all the mechs, and the little guys stand a chance.

If the response to this would be that most victories are earned via crits, and getting the enemy mech's internal systems into the black, then I would point out that this seems to make Structure unnecessary.

This version of the game makes substantial changes to Structure, crits, and Armor. Ideally we want Structure loss and critical its to both be viable ways of taking down an enemy mech. Trouble is, it's hard to know precisely how it works without extensive testing. The more that people can test combat and see how it goes, the more we can refine it. So we encourage everyone to not just read the rules - which is helpful, no doubt about it - but also to play games. Even your solitary mech-vs-mech battle generates data that helps us a lot.[/quote]


I don't know that I will have the opportunity to do actual game-play testing within the next few days, unfortunately. My observations are based on probabilities only, so I suppose it would be more accurate to say that the odds of two Talons and a Frostbite taking down a Headsman are extremely slim. Assuming I'm doing my math right here, a Talon has a 55% chance of hitting the Headsman with each buzzsaw, and a 5% chance of scoring a crit. On a non-crit hit, the Talon is going to do an average of 22 points of damage and the buzzsaw ignores 5 points of armor. So on average, a Talon, if it hits, is going to do 7 points of damage to the Headsman. The odds roughly equate to two Talons hitting the Headsman a total of twice per round, for a total of 14 points of damage. At that rate, it would take about 36 rounds to take the Headsman down, and that's if the Talons can survive that long. On average, that time may be shortened by a round or two if the odds for crits are factored in. The Talons have nothing special that can give them any kind of significant edge, although with a Frostbite on their side, they may have success tripping the Headsman. The Frostbite alone is only going to do an average of -7 points of damage. By contrast, the Headsman is going to hit 60% of the time, with a 10% chance of scoring a crit, and is going to do an average of 40 points of damage on a normal hit. Against the Talon's Armor of 11, that's an average 19 points of damage per round, which is a crit-by-damage and which has the chance of reducing the Talon's armor even further. The Frostbite will only survive a couple of average hits from the Headsman.

How quickly the Headsman dispatches the Talons and Frostbite may be kind of a moot point -- it's clearly designed to demolish just about anything. But the odds of a group of smaller mechs in this example, whose point total is virtually equal to to the Headsman's, are very slim.

I will point out that I am deliberately picking on the strongest mech and some of the weakest ones, and I'm deliberately looking for mismatches between mechs -- I didn't pick this group of mechs at random.

Whether this is a bug or a feature is for you to decide.

[mythfish]

I don't know that I will have the opportunity to do actual game-play testing within the next few days, unfortunately. My observations are based on probabilities only, so I suppose it would be more accurate to say that the odds of two Talons and a Frostbite taking down a Headsman are extremely slim. Assuming I'm doing my math right here, a Talon has a 55% chance of hitting the Headsman with each buzzsaw, and a 5% chance of scoring a crit. On a non-crit hit, the Talon is going to do an average of 22 points of damage and the buzzsaw ignores 5 points of armor. So on average, a Talon, if it hits, is going to do 7 points of damage to the Headsman. The odds roughly equate to two Talons hitting the Headsman a total of twice per round, for a total of 14 points of damage. At that rate, it would take about 36 rounds to take the Headsman down, and that's if the Talons can survive that long. On average, that time may be shortened by a round or two if the odds for crits are factored in. The Talons have nothing special that can give them any kind of significant edge, although with a Frostbite on their side, they may have success tripping the Headsman. The Frostbite alone is only going to do an average of -7 points of damage. By contrast, the Headsman is going to hit 60% of the time, with a 10% chance of scoring a crit, and is going to do an average of 40 points of damage on a normal hit. Against the Talon's Armor of 11, that's an average 19 points of damage per round, which is a crit-by-damage and which has the chance of reducing the Talon's armor even further. The Frostbite will only survive a couple of average hits from the Headsman.

How quickly the Headsman dispatches the Talons and Frostbite may be kind of a moot point -- it's clearly designed to demolish just about anything. But the odds of a group of smaller mechs in this example, whose point total is virtually equal to to the Headsman's, are very slim.

I will point out that I am deliberately picking on the strongest mech and some of the weakest ones, and I'm deliberately looking for mismatches between mechs -- I didn't pick this group of mechs at random.

I think this battle would be a lot more even than you think. My money would actually be on the Talons & Frostbite. My experience has been that because of the auto-crits with high accuracy rolls, the odds seem to slightly favor the side with more attacks, regardless of the damages and armors involved. And keeping in mind that through tactics, character abilities, and other mech enhancements it's not to difficult to get your odds of an auto-crit to around 25%, it doesn't really matter how high the Headsman's armor is.

I have a playtest scheduled for this afternoon. We'll run this very fight and see what happens.

Re: Portal Master
Suppose it works just like it says on a Great result. On a Good result, you can go to any unoccupied space within 4 hexes. On an Awful result, your opponent can put you anywhere on the map. Would that be useful enough that people might use it?

(I totally agree I wouldn't spend the points on it as is).

[khshea]

I think this battle would be a lot more even than you think. My money would actually be on the Talons & Frostbite. My experience has been that because of the auto-crits with high accuracy rolls, the odds seem to slightly favor the side with more attacks, regardless of the damages and armors involved. And keeping in mind that through tactics, character abilities, and other mech enhancements it's not to difficult to get your odds of an auto-crit to around 25%, it doesn't really matter how high the Headsman's armor is.

I have a playtest scheduled for this afternoon. We'll run this very fight and see what happens.

Re: Portal Master
Suppose it works just like it says on a Great result. On a Good result, you can go to any unoccupied space within 4 hexes. On an Awful result, your opponent can put you anywhere on the map. Would that be useful enough that people might use it?

(I totally agree I wouldn't spend the points on it as is).



The fight may be closer than I think it is too. I'll point out that the Talons have a -1 Accuracy with the buzzsaws, so they're only going to auto-crit on a natural 20. The Talons, as written, don't have any characters or mech enhancements other than a +1 Speed, so their only option to get any kind of Accuracy bonus would be tactics and terrain. In order to get a crit-by-damage, they'll need a natural 13 or better on the damage roll, which comes out to a 40% chance. It may be that boarding is what needs to be used for the little guys to win -- maybe that's the equalizer, especially since the boarding and boarding damage tables favor the attacker. But then the Headsman's crew could just abandon the mech and then board it themselves. I know that's what I'd do. Anyway, food for thought, for what it's worth.

Your proposed revision to the Portal Master sounds like an improvement, I would say. I'd definitely be more inclined to take it as a character ability if it had a 30% rate of success. On a Good result would the player get to reorient their mech? What sort of roll would be needed to stand a fallen mech up?

[mythfish]

The fight may be closer than I think it is too. I'll point out that the Talons have a -1 Accuracy with the buzzsaws, so they're only going to auto-crit on a natural 20. The Talons, as written, don't have any characters or mech enhancements other than a +1 Speed, so their only option to get any kind of Accuracy bonus would be tactics and terrain. In order to get a crit-by-damage, they'll need a natural 13 or better on the damage roll, which comes out to a 40% chance. It may be that boarding is what needs to be used for the little guys to win -- maybe that's the equalizer, especially since the boarding and boarding damage tables favor the attacker. But then the Headsman's crew could just abandon the mech and then board it themselves. I know that's what I'd do. Anyway, food for thought, for what it's worth.

The Talons and Frostbite did indeed win the battle, though it could have easily gone the other way. It looked bad for our heroes (the Talon/Frostbite team) at the beginning of the game when one Talon was lost quickly due to me not quite knowing which tactics to use and making a couple bad dice rolls.

Once I figured out the tactics to use, things went much smoother. First I had to lure him out into clear terrain where my better Speed and Maneuver could best be used to my advantage. The ice from the Spellthrower was less of a help than I'd hoped it would be, but one of the two times he fell I managed to score 2 auto-crits on him with the +4 Accuracy bonus. Four crits to the body and his armor is only 10, and the Talon's buzzsaws are ignoring 5 points of that. Once I got to that point, it was merely a matter of maximizing the number of attacks I could make against him while minimizing his attacks against me. Whenever possible, I maneuvered the Talon around to a rear hex where he could only hit me with one axe and I could hit with both buzzsaws. Meanwhile, the Frostbite was staying out of his reach and using the spellthrower or making lance attacks with the mech jockey's harrier attack ability.

That said, the game could have easily gone the other way. My opponent was hardly able to win a tactics roll in the last half of the game, so I was pretty firmly in control. Both my remaining mechs at the end of the game were down to about half their structure (meaning that three or four good hits from a Headsman could have finished me off). So I'd say it was a pretty close game. The battle took about an hour.

[walrusjester]

The key question: was the battle fun?

[mythfish]

I thought it was okay, but I think he was pretty frustrated with losing so many tactics rolls.

[khshea]

The fight may be closer than I think it is too. I'll point out that the Talons have a -1 Accuracy with the buzzsaws, so they're only going to auto-crit on a natural 20. The Talons, as written, don't have any characters or mech enhancements other than a +1 Speed, so their only option to get any kind of Accuracy bonus would be tactics and terrain. In order to get a crit-by-damage, they'll need a natural 13 or better on the damage roll, which comes out to a 40% chance. It may be that boarding is what needs to be used for the little guys to win -- maybe that's the equalizer, especially since the boarding and boarding damage tables favor the attacker. But then the Headsman's crew could just abandon the mech and then board it themselves. I know that's what I'd do. Anyway, food for thought, for what it's worth.

The Talons and Frostbite did indeed win the battle, though it could have easily gone the other way. It looked bad for our heroes (the Talon/Frostbite team) at the beginning of the game when one Talon was lost quickly due to me not quite knowing which tactics to use and making a couple bad dice rolls.

Once I figured out the tactics to use, things went much smoother. First I had to lure him out into clear terrain where my better Speed and Maneuver could best be used to my advantage. The ice from the Spellthrower was less of a help than I'd hoped it would be, but one of the two times he fell I managed to score 2 auto-crits on him with the +4 Accuracy bonus. Four crits to the body and his armor is only 10, and the Talon's buzzsaws are ignoring 5 points of that. Once I got to that point, it was merely a matter of maximizing the number of attacks I could make against him while minimizing his attacks against me. Whenever possible, I maneuvered the Talon around to a rear hex where he could only hit me with one axe and I could hit with both buzzsaws. Meanwhile, the Frostbite was staying out of his reach and using the spellthrower or making lance attacks with the mech jockey's harrier attack ability.

That said, the game could have easily gone the other way. My opponent was hardly able to win a tactics roll in the last half of the game, so I was pretty firmly in control. Both my remaining mechs at the end of the game were down to about half their structure (meaning that three or four good hits from a Headsman could have finished me off). So I'd say it was a pretty close game. The battle took about an hour.

Cool, I'm glad to hear that. In addition to Matt's question, do you think that the Talon-Frostbite team could beat the Headsman half the time, and the Headsman could win the other half?

[mythfish]

Cool, I'm glad to hear that. In addition to Matt's question, do you think that the Talon-Frostbite team could beat the Headsman half the time, and the Headsman could win the other half?

Nope, now that I know what tactics to use I'm fairly sure the Talon/Frostbite team could probably beat the Headsman somewhat more than half the time. The Headsman could possibly shake things up by using the hooks more, but that's really only an advantage if he wins tactics and the Talon/Frostbite player makes a blunder. Using the Coglayer's redline ability to get an extra melee phase can really do some whomping damage, but only in the right circumstances, without bad dice luck, and at some fairly great risk. But I'm not confident enough to say that I could win a lot more than half the time.

I look at mech design in this game a lot like building a deck in the CCG of your choice. All decks of 60 cards are theoretically equal, like all mech forces of 300 points are theoretically equal. But certain deck types and certain combinations of forces will almost always win against certain other deck types and certain other combinations of forces. I'm okay with that. It's when a certain combination is equally stompy against all (or many) other types that there's a problem. The Talon/Frostbite combo might always beat a Headsman, but I'm sure the Headsman player could come back with a different force of equal points using a different strategy that would almost always beat the Talon/Frostbite.

[khshea]

Cool, I'm glad to hear that. In addition to Matt's question, do you think that the Talon-Frostbite team could beat the Headsman half the time, and the Headsman could win the other half?

Nope, now that I know what tactics to use I'm fairly sure the Talon/Frostbite team could probably beat the Headsman somewhat more than half the time. The Headsman could possibly shake things up by using the hooks more, but that's really only an advantage if he wins tactics and the Talon/Frostbite player makes a blunder. Using the Coglayer's redline ability to get an extra melee phase can really do some whomping damage, but only in the right circumstances, without bad dice luck, and at some fairly great risk. But I'm not confident enough to say that I could win a lot more than half the time.

I look at mech design in this game a lot like building a deck in the CCG of your choice. All decks of 60 cards are theoretically equal, like all mech forces of 300 points are theoretically equal. But certain deck types and certain combinations of forces will almost always win against certain other deck types and certain other combinations of forces. I'm okay with that. It's when a certain combination is equally stompy against all (or many) other types that there's a problem. The Talon/Frostbite combo might always beat a Headsman, but I'm sure the Headsman player could come back with a different force of equal points using a different strategy that would almost always beat the Talon/Frostbite.

There will always be incidental matchup problems in a game like this, I suspect. As long as the power equality is roughly the same for the points spent, though, so that 300 points spent one way will generally be an even challenge for 300 points spent a different way, my concerns are alleviated. I was mainly worried that the more points in a single mech, and the more armor and structure it possessed, created an unsurmountable problem for smaller scale mechs. I am glad to see that disproven.

[khshea]

Or should that be "insurmountable?"

"Non-surmountable?"