Is the game broken or is there a small minority of players abusing
unbalanced game mechanics to achieve there own ends?

I think I just answered my own question.

Seriously, is it the game or is it the frenzy that is generated by Limited Edition prizes.

I think I just answered my own question again.

Yes some game mechanics are more powerful than others, but the most broken aspect of the game seems to be greed.

Most of the complaints I read seem to boil down to the appearance of an uneven distribution of prizes.

Is it the game?

Is it the prize system?

Am I oversimplifying?

Other thoughts....

The game is slightly unbalanced in areas, but wouldn't be too difficult to fix.

The proposed rules are a step in the right direction, as is the extended time for internal playtesting.

The imbalance, however, is such that a fix is required to make the game strategy-friendly.

Greed is endemic, not only to MechWarrior, or CMGs, or wargames in general. It ruins businesses, families, friendships, governments... Greed is there, and it doesn't intrinsically make MW:DA suck. However, it's possible to "greed-proof" and "jerk-proof" the game somewhat.

Jerk-proofing is easier to address, however; making it so that "a small minority of players abusing
unbalanced game mechanics to achieve there own ends" don't wind up as the only ones who can win competitively.

Because, in all seriousness, "cheapness" doesn't apply. If you're playing a game with a competitive side, you do what it takes to win within the rules that exist. If the rules are dumb, then we can safely say that the problem is with the game, not with the players who exploit its weaknesses.

How about players who knowingly lie and accuse their opponents of cheating?

Cheater

LEs and stuff are an extremely important part of the game, its the rules that make it "broken"
The prizes are basically what drive the game anyway. People who play "cheese" are just playing the most playable pieces anyway, why complain? You can play cheese right back at them.

How about players who knowingly lie and accuse their opponents of cheating?

Man, that even happens in golf. That happens in checkers, it happens in poker. I don't think it's relevant to a discussion of how to improve MechWarrior -- it's more germane to a talk about failures in parenting, or possibly grade school.

It seems to be the general conclusion that the players are much more broken than the game.

We ll to be honest the Rules are to simple in my book.

WK has stated that MW is to target "serious" wargamers. Having played anything from risks to Napoleonic wargames the Rules for MW are seriously oversimplified.

For me they can add morale rules to counter infantery importance and a bunch of other stuff. Their instance to keep it simple while adding new game mechanics is breaking them up.

But yes players are also an important element in what is acceptable. I simply hope that it will lead to a situation in where all over the globe we all play the same game.

I fear that ssoner or later more and more BM will simply had their own "house" rules as the rules to play tournements with.

I just play as is. And if the game stops being fun i will play something else.

Altough i will always play some BT related game i am afraid.

You know, I has it occured to you that it could not be failures in parenting, or failures in school, but that some people are just A-holes.

Also, I think it would be funny and true if someone went on one of those talk shows (sally, etc) and said "My parents did a good job, school did a good job, I'm just f*%ked up."