56 replies to this topic

[Solis Obscuri]

HammerSwarm, on 17 September 2013 - 06:17 AM, said:

Question: Isn't a mech a large mobile firing platform? As such wouldn't the manufacturers have planned for recoil?

Yes, but recoil from large weapons can't be absorbed instantaneously; watch some modern day "large mobile firing platforms" rock on their suspension after firing a single heavy weapon:

http://youtu.be/AlErcNY-VjQ?t=2m26s

[Gaan Cathal]

Volthorne, on 18 September 2013 - 08:06 PM, said:

The capacitors do recharge during the recycle. The whole "charge up to fire" thing has to do with prepping to discharge the build-up from the recycle (in this case we'll assume it involves stopping the flow of power to the capacitors and activating the electromagnet holding the slug in position).

No. It has nothing to do with prepping to discharge the build-up from the recycle. It has to do with PGI thinking that it'd be a good way to decouple the PPC and Gauss, as opposed to further differentiating their projectile speeds.

[Appogee]

I wrote a long post on the advantages of adding recoil some time back.

Lots of people agreed in principle.

PGI decided instead to focus on bobble heads.

[Volthorne]

Gaan Cathal, on 19 September 2013 - 08:17 AM, said:

No. It has nothing to do with prepping to discharge the build-up from the recycle. It has to do with PGI thinking that it'd be a good way to decouple the PPC and Gauss, as opposed to further differentiating their projectile speeds.

I'm not sure how much more you could currently {Richard Cameron} around with projectile speeds and still have them at a reasonable clip, especially for long-ranged weapons such as PPCs and Gauss Rifles. Any slower for the PPC and it's not worth the effort to lead. Any faster for the Gauss and it might as well be a replica CERLLas from MW4 (hit-scan, insta-damage).

Honestly, how about you ******* think for a second before typing something out. Actually think about it. Not just "oh, well, PGI blah blah blah everything they do is wrong". I dare you to come up with a better way to differentiate Gauss Rifles from PPCs.

Edited by Volthorne, 19 September 2013 - 06:12 PM.

[Gaan Cathal]

Volthorne, on 19 September 2013 - 06:10 PM, said:

I'm not sure how much more you could currently {David Cameron} around with projectile speeds and still have them at a reasonable clip, especially for long-ranged weapons such as PPCs and Gauss Rifles. Any slower for the PPC and it's not worth the effort to lead. Any faster for the Gauss and it might as well be a replica CERLLas from MW4 (hit-scan, insta-damage).

Honestly, how about you ******* think for a second before typing something out. Actually think about it. Not just "oh, well, PGI blah blah blah everything they do is wrong". I dare you to come up with a better way to differentiate Gauss Rifles from PPCs.

The PPC has less range than the UAC/5, and currently sits at a projectile speed of 1.5k compared with 1.3k for the UAC/5. I think it can drop a bit of velocity. The Gauss is probably fine at 2k, could go to 2.2k and still be fine IMO.

As for better ways to differentiate Gauss Rifles from PPCs without poorly implemented and totally undocumented new-player-punishing charge-up on the less potent and problematic of the two weapons? For a start, the PPC can, as I pointed out above, have it's velocity lowered a tad, coupling it with the (U)AC/5 wouldn't have anywhere near as bad results as coupling with the Gauss since the (U)AC/5 generates some heat. What isn't good for the game is a silly little minigame to fire the Gauss that doesn't actually prevent anyone who knows about it firing it in tandem with (ER)PPCs, but punishes new players who have no idea it's even there until they ask for the umpteeth time in mapchat why their Gauss just doesn't work and finally get a response that isn't "lol, noob".

What would really make a difference across the board is simply changing range falloff so it's exponential rather than linear, and possibly shortening falloff ranges across the board. Part of the problem with the AC/10, for example, is that at AC/10 optimal, the AC/20 does....10 damage. This causes issues across the board (Gauss doing high damage right out beyond LRM range cap, etc) and would really make range differences matter if it was changed. Because of the different max-range calculations, this would go some way to unhooking the ERPCC and the Gauss, although that's a fairly secondary benefit IMO, and the main unhooking should be projectile velocity (TBH, I think they're probably sufficiently unhooked with current velocities and without the silly Gauss-charge gimmick).

[Volthorne]

Gaan Cathal, on 19 September 2013 - 06:57 PM, said:

The PPC has less range than the UAC/5, and currently sits at a projectile speed of 1.5k compared with 1.3k for the UAC/5. I think it can drop a bit of velocity. The Gauss is probably fine at 2k, could go to 2.2k and still be fine IMO.

So... you want to put the PPC (which deals 10 damage) at the same travel speed as the AC/5 (which deals 5 damage, duh). The PPC weighs 7 tons, AC/5 8. All you're doing is trading ammo requirements (AC/5 with less than two tons is bad) for a bit more heat. I can't possibly see this ending well if you have to pick between a heavy energy or a mid-weight ballistic to go in as your primary or secondary weapon.

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As for better ways to differentiate Gauss Rifles from PPCs without poorly implemented and totally undocumented new-player-punishing charge-up on the less potent and problematic of the two weapons?

Tutorials. Next.

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What isn't good for the game is a silly little minigame to fire the Gauss that doesn't actually prevent anyone who knows about it firing it in tandem with (ER)PPCs, but punishes new players who have no idea it's even there until they ask for the umpteeth time in mapchat why their Gauss just doesn't work and finally get a response that isn't "lol, noob".

The Gauss is a godly weapon, even with the firing delay. Making PPCs slightly slower and/or the Gauss slightly faster isn't going to magically make the problem of that particular weapon combination go away. I honestly want you to try and come up with a solution that decouples them as well as the one PGI gave us does.

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What would really make a difference across the board is simply changing range falloff so it's exponential rather than linear, and possibly shortening falloff ranges across the board.

Might as well just have the magical "oh, by the way, your bullet stopped dead after going one inch past it's optimal rated distance" from the TT then.

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Part of the problem with the AC/10, for example, is that at AC/10 optimal, the AC/20 does....10 damage.

I agree, this is a problem.

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This causes issues across the board (Gauss doing high damage right out beyond LRM range cap, etc) and would really make range differences matter if it was changed.

You know what else would make range differences matter? Removing god-mode ECM so brawlers can actually get fire-support while moving in to CQC (also arm movement-speed penalties based on how cumbersome the weapons you have in there are - not necessarily based on crits or tonnage).

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Because of the different max-range calculations, this would go some way to unhooking the ERPCC and the Gauss, although that's a fairly secondary benefit IMO, and the main unhooking should be projectile velocity (TBH, I think they're probably sufficiently unhooked with current velocities and without the silly Gauss-charge gimmick).

At 1000m (which is basically where engagement begins anyway), the difference in arrival time between a PPC charge and a Gauss slug is 0.25s. Yep. TOTALLY enough to make a difference. Considering the average reaction time of a human is 0.215s, you're (much) more likely to hit different locations due to latency than someone actually twisting or moving to spread your damage.

Edited by Volthorne, 20 September 2013 - 11:55 PM.

[Gaan Cathal]

Volthorne, on 20 September 2013 - 11:51 PM, said:

So... you want to put the PPC (which deals 10 damage) at the same travel speed as the AC/5 (which deals 5 damage, duh). The PPC weighs 7 tons, AC/5 8. All you're doing is trading ammo requirements (AC/5 with less than two tons is bad) for a bit more heat. I can't possibly see this ending well if you have to pick between a heavy energy or a mid-weight ballistic to go in as your primary or secondary weapon.

Wait, you're saying that lowering PPC speed to AC/5 speed would increase it's relative desirability? I mean, I get that the PPC is better ton-for-ton than the AC/5 if you ignore heat, that's true. That's also the current state of affairs. Making the PPC worse (slower projectile is worse, no matter how minor a difference) can't make it more superior to a weapon that doesn't change.

Volthorne, on 20 September 2013 - 11:51 PM, said:

Tutorials. Next.

They teach you how to WSAD. Next.

Volthorne, on 20 September 2013 - 11:51 PM, said:

The Gauss is a godly weapon, even with the firing delay. Making PPCs slightly slower and/or the Gauss slightly faster isn't going to magically make the problem of that particular weapon combination go away. I honestly want you to try and come up with a solution that decouples them as well as the one PGI gave us does.

Better than not at all? Believe me, with the firing delay in place on the gauss it is quite possible (and not even particularly hard) to fire both gauss and PPCs at the same time. It does nothing to decouple them for anyone with a mouse possessing more than one button, the ability to set up weapon groups and a reasonable sense of timing, given a modicum of practice. If you can fire weapons with approximately the same range at the same time, the only way to decouple them is to differentiate their velocities such as they arrive at different times.

Volthorne, on 20 September 2013 - 11:51 PM, said:

Might as well just have the magical "oh, by the way, your bullet stopped dead after going one inch past it's optimal rated distance" from the TT then.

Or not, because that would be utterly terrible. There's a very good argument for not having a dead-stop end of range, since it's unintuitive, frustrating and will make people rage when the server decides someone was somewhere slightly different. However, giving an AC/20 as much damage as an AC/10 at the latter's optimal is a prime example of how the extreme falloff ranges implemented impact weapon balance, although it is far from the only affected weapon. Making falloff exponential would mean that you're still doing near-max damage if they're a foot or so out of range, but contract effective ranges down so they're much closer to optimal ranges and make differences in range between weapons more significant.

Volthorne, on 20 September 2013 - 11:51 PM, said:

You know what else would make range differences matter? Removing god-mode ECM so brawlers can actually get fire-support while moving in to CQC (also arm movement-speed penalties based on how cumbersome the weapons you have in there are - not necessarily based on crits or tonnage).

ECM hasn't been god-mode for months (not that I agree with the current implementation, but that's because it's stupid, not because it's overpowered), and all those arm-movement penalties would do is encourage static play, if anything. It certainly wouldn't solve the issue that a lot of weapons are effective well beyond their optimal range (and lets not even start on the completely arbitrary fact that ballistics get a much bigger benefit than lasers when it comes to falloff range).

Volthorne, on 20 September 2013 - 11:51 PM, said:

At 1000m (which is basically where engagement begins anyway), the difference in arrival time between a PPC charge and a Gauss slug is 0.25s. Yep. TOTALLY enough to make a difference. Considering the average reaction time of a human is 0.215s, you're (much) more likely to hit different locations due to latency than someone actually twisting or moving to spread your damage.

I don't see the problem with pegging a stationary or 0-lateral target at range with the entire volley in one location. If you introduce any passive torso movement or lateral motion it becomes a major factor in what compartment you hit at that range.

Also, your reaction time example is fallacious, since you're assuming the first thing the pilot knows about the situation is the gauss round hitting them. If they see the PPC rounds heading towards them they've got ~0.7s barrel-to-impact to react, and at 1000m even a slight rotation will spread the impacts.

Never mind , of course, that I'm arguing for a slower projectile speed on the PPC, which would increase that reaction time in any case, as well as (frankly more importantly) increasing the time gap between impact for any passive motion on part of the target (as opposed to reactive) to separate the compartments hit.

[Johnny Z]

+1 for mech sim game, a great idea but only realistic for the heavier ac weapon, maybe the 10 and 20. Gauss wouldnt have any sudden recoil at all, since it works more like a slingshot.

[Gaan Cathal]

Johnny Z, on 21 September 2013 - 08:00 AM, said:

+1 for mech sim game, a great idea but only realistic for the heavier ac weapon, maybe the 10 and 20. Gauss wouldnt have any sudden recoil at all, since it works more like a slingshot.

Do explain to me how coilguns (or, totally unrelatedly, slingshots) are cable to circumvent Newton's Third Law, I'm fascinated.

[Funkadelic Mayhem]

recoil for what exactly?

[Tweaks]

No matter how good the anti-recoil system is on a 'Mech, the simple placement of some of the weapons should make your whole 'Mech shake after every shot. That said, recoil should only apply to ballistic and missile weapons.

The recoil should move your crosshair in the opposite direction after every shot. For example, firing an AC/20 mounted to the right arm should rock your cockpit and move your crosshair a little bit towards the upper left corner of the HUD so you have to re-aim before firing the next one.

Special modules could be added to mitigate this effect to some extent, but never completely cancel it.

I think this would help to balance the AC/2 and AC/5 spam a little and would be much more realistic.

Johnny Z, on 21 September 2013 - 08:00 AM, said:

+1 for mech sim game, a great idea but only realistic for the heavier ac weapon, maybe the 10 and 20. Gauss wouldnt have any sudden recoil at all, since it works more like a slingshot.

I don't know where you learned science and physics but this is plain wrong. The force needed to push the gauss projectile forward generates as much force on the back of the canon as it does on the projectile itself, thus the recoil. Considering the force applied to the gauss projectile is so huge, the recoil would be as well.

"Law III: To every action there is always an equal and opposite reaction: or the forces of two bodies on each other are always equal and are directed in opposite directions."

Edited by Tweaks, 21 September 2013 - 08:25 AM.

[Johnny Z]

Tweaks, on 21 September 2013 - 08:18 AM, said:

No matter how good the anti-recoil system is on a 'Mech, the simple placement of some of the weapons should make your whole 'Mech shake after every shot. That said, recoil should only apply to ballistic and missile weapons.

The recoil should move your crosshair in the opposite direction after every shot. For example, firing an AC/20 mounted to the right arm should rock your cockpit and move your crosshair a little bit towards the upper left corner of the HUD so you have to re-aim before firing the next one.

Special modules could be added to mitigate this effect to some extent, but never completely cancel it.

I think this would help to balance the AC/2 and AC/5 spam a little and would be much more realistic.


I don't know where you learned science and physics but this is plain wrong. The force needed to push the gauss projectile forward generates as much force on the back of the canon as it does on the projectile itself, thus the recoil. Considering the force applied to the gauss projectile is so huge, the recoil would be as well.

"Law III: To every action there is always an equal and opposite reaction: or the forces of two bodies on each other are always equal and are directed in opposite directions."

For the partially blind readers here I will repeat, the gauss wouldnt have a "sudden recoil" I guess it would be more like the missiles recoil.

[Veranova]

Tweaks, on 21 September 2013 - 08:18 AM, said:

I think this would help to balance the AC/2 and AC/5 spam a little and would be much more realistic.

Totally agree, and totally wish for this.
When we're getting spammed we are shaking so much as to make firing back difficult.
Why shouldn't they be shaking so much as to make tracking our evasive movements difficult?

[Tweaks]

Johnny Z, on 21 September 2013 - 08:31 AM, said:

For the partially blind readers here I will repeat, the gauss wouldnt have a "sudden recoil" I guess it would be more like the missiles recoil.

That's even worse and makes even less sense. Why would it be "delayed" recoil when the gauss cannon has the highest velocity of all ballistic weapons? The release of energy produced by the gauss is instant, and not like a giant slingshot like you describe it. It charges and then uncharges in a spit second. Go watch videos of real life railguns and you'll see. The recoil is pretty much instant!

[Johnny Z]

Tweaks, on 21 September 2013 - 08:50 AM, said:

That's even worse and makes even less sense. Why would it be "delayed" recoil when the gauss cannon has the highest velocity of all ballistic weapons? The release of energy produced by the gauss is instant, and not like a giant slingshot like you describe it. It charges and then uncharges in a spit second. Go watch videos of real life railguns and you'll see. The recoil is pretty much instant!

I must be in the wrong topic, because i thought we were talking about a 31st century space fiction game, I dont think the impossible lasers need a sudden recoil either btw.

[Tweaks]

Johnny Z, on 21 September 2013 - 08:54 AM, said:

I must be in the wrong topic, because i thought we were talking about a 31st century space fiction game, I dont think the impossible lasers need a sudden recoil either btw.

Energy weapons wouldn't have recoil because light or energy particles don't produce enough force. I guess PPCs could produce a slight one though because of the magnetic field it produces, but it wouldn't be nearly as big as a ballistic weapon.

Ballistic and missile weapons all produce force. They require either a burst of magnetic energy (gauss), explosions (ACs, MGs) or thrust (missiles), each of which produce an equal amount of opposite force, thus the recoil.

Just because MechWarrior is a 31st century space fiction game, doesn't mean the basic laws of physics cease to exist or that you can change them for "balance purposes". I'm sorry but you just don't make sense, and it makes me laugh everytime I hear someone say this.

The point is, if you decide to apply recoil effects to ballistic weapons, then you can't just ignore other weapons that would logically also produce recoil.

[Johnny Z]

Tweaks, on 21 September 2013 - 09:02 AM, said:

Energy weapons wouldn't have recoil because light or energy particles don't produce enough force. I guess PPCs could produce a slight one though because of the magnetic field it produces, but it wouldn't be nearly as big as a ballistic weapon.

Ballistic and missile weapons all produce force. They require either a burst of magnetic energy (gauss), explosions (ACs, MGs) or thrust (missiles), each of which produce an equal amount of opposite force, thus the recoil.

Just because MechWarrior is a 31st century space fiction game, doesn't mean the basic laws of physics cease to exist or that you can change them for "balance purposes". I'm sorry but you just don't make sense, and it makes me laugh everytime I hear someone say this.

The point is, if you decide to apply recoil effects to ballistic weapons, then you can't just ignore other weapons that would logically also produce recoil.

Your wrongness on the point is impressive, but if for balance and for fun/immersion it was better for the gauss to have a recoil, then I am for it.

Edited by Johnny Z, 21 September 2013 - 09:48 AM.

[Tweaks]

Johnny Z, on 21 September 2013 - 09:44 AM, said:

Your wrongness on the point is impressive (...)

Please enlighten us on what is wrong in there exactly?

[Gaan Cathal]

Tweaks, on 21 September 2013 - 09:47 AM, said:

Please enlighten us on what is wrong in there exactly?

The fact that lasers do, quite definitely, produce recoil and are most certainly not immune to Newton's Third Law (although non-self-targeting examples should be immune to the Third Law of Robotics, if you thought we were talking about that one) because physics.

[Volthorne]

Gaan Cathal, on 21 September 2013 - 07:47 AM, said:

Wait, you're saying that lowering PPC speed to AC/5 speed would increase it's relative desirability? I mean, I get that the PPC is better ton-for-ton than the AC/5 if you ignore heat, that's true. That's also the current state of affairs. Making the PPC worse (slower projectile is worse, no matter how minor a difference) can't make it more superior to a weapon that doesn't change.

What I'm saying is that the AC/5 is seen as more of a mid-range weapon than a long-range one, despite having an overall longer effective range than the PPC. Probably due to only doing 5 damage and having a faster recycle, which pegs it as a better "beat them up as I move in closer"-type deal.

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They teach you how to WSAD. Next.

Currently? Yeah, that's about it. Does that mean in the future there won't also be weapons tutorials? My point was that you can cover weapon mechanics in tutorials, regardless of if said tutorials actually currently exist or not.

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Better than not at all? Believe me, with the firing delay in place on the gauss it is quite possible (and not even particularly hard) to fire both gauss and PPCs at the same time. It does nothing to decouple them for anyone with a mouse possessing more than one button, the ability to set up weapon groups and a reasonable sense of timing, given a modicum of practice. If you can fire weapons with approximately the same range at the same time, the only way to decouple them is to differentiate their velocities such as they arrive at different times.

Can you still fire them together MANUALLY? Yes. As you stated, it doesn't decouple them for someone with half a brain, but that wasn't the intended goal. The intended goal was to remove one-button "lololololol 60-point damage!" builds. I would say it takes care of what it was intended for rather well.

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Or not, because that would be utterly terrible. There's a very good argument for not having a dead-stop end of range, since it's unintuitive, frustrating and will make people rage when the server decides someone was somewhere slightly different. However, giving an AC/20 as much damage as an AC/10 at the latter's optimal is a prime example of how the extreme falloff ranges implemented impact weapon balance, although it is far from the only affected weapon. Making falloff exponential would mean that you're still doing near-max damage if they're a foot or so out of range, but contract effective ranges down so they're much closer to optimal ranges and make differences in range between weapons more significant.

Would it increase the difference between weapons and their roles? Yeah, you could argue that. You could also argue that it would feel like shooting through Jell-o or maybe ballistic gel. I don't think that would do much for the game either, personally.

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ECM hasn't been god-mode for months (not that I agree with the current implementation, but that's because it's stupid, not because it's overpowered), and all those arm-movement penalties would do is encourage static play, if anything. It certainly wouldn't solve the issue that a lot of weapons are effective well beyond their optimal range (and lets not even start on the completely arbitrary fact that ballistics get a much bigger benefit than lasers when it comes to falloff range).

So not being able to detect the entire enemy team under a single ECM at 600m - where LRMs are still useful - isn't godmode? Fixing the godmode within a certain range bracket doesn't make it NOT godmode for the rest of it's effective distance (which is still basically the whole map). I would also like to know how arm-movement penalties would encourage static play? Assuming they were implemented, if you had a Gauss in your arm it would move at (for example) -30%. Suddenly, it becomes a lot harder to track targets that are moving quick and close to you! AC/20s wouldn't even be affected for the most part, because you've already sacrificed 100% horizontal movement. Think about it for a second.

I still agree that something needs to be done about optimal ranges and stuff, but making people think they're shooting through Jell-o isn't the answer (and if you wanted to start on the completely arbitrary extra range ballistics have, I'd say beam weapons - PPCs are technically optical ballistics - should get up to +100% damage at point-blank range, down to their current damage at optimal range due to atmospheric dissipation).

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I don't see the problem with pegging a stationary or 0-lateral target at range with the entire volley in one location. If you introduce any passive torso movement or lateral motion it becomes a major factor in what compartment you hit at that range.

Also, your reaction time example is fallacious, since you're assuming the first thing the pilot knows about the situation is the gauss round hitting them. If they see the PPC rounds heading towards them they've got ~0.7s barrel-to-impact to react, and at 1000m even a slight rotation will spread the impacts.

Never mind , of course, that I'm arguing for a slower projectile speed on the PPC, which would increase that reaction time in any case, as well as (frankly more importantly) increasing the time gap between impact for any passive motion on part of the target (as opposed to reactive) to separate the compartments hit.

You're assuming the target actually gets the chance to see the incoming shots. If your "sniper" allows his shots to be seen and gives the opponent time to react, then clearly he's done something wrong. It's also not very hard to set up a macro (or, you know, click again almost immediately) that fires the Gauss 0.Xs after the PPC fires to ensure they land at almost the exact same time at Y distance. Again, further changing the travel speeds won't make any noticeable difference, because you're dealing with such small amounts of time.

Gaan Cathal, on 21 September 2013 - 12:46 PM, said:

The fact that lasers do, quite definitely, produce recoil and are most certainly not immune to Newton's Third Law (although non-self-targeting examples should be immune to the Third Law of Robotics, if you thought we were talking about that one) because physics.

You are aware of exactly how ridiculously high the power requirement is for producing even just 1mm of recoil for a laser is, right? It can otherwise be treated as effectively 0 (not saying that there isn't recoil but it is basically negligible).

Edited by Volthorne, 21 September 2013 - 01:24 PM.