Anyway. LRMs on an Atlas can be a mixed thing.
What you absolutely must make sure you do is you bring a good amount of frontal armor, and a few good guns for close range defense.
Now doing an Atlas as an LRM boat with little to nothing else... You'd better know the best places to station yourself and cross your fingers hoping for a great map that works in your favor, because otherwise you're not gonna be much use to anyone.
Friends dont let friends LRM Atlas. Unless everyone is trolololol-ing.
If you simply must LRM, use a Stalker or Awesome.
I see the allure of LRMs to noobs.
Long range damage with relative safety. But many noobs dont realize that begging for locks means a teammate is losing armor in the process. Is the LRM boat willing to do the same? Bit of a conundrum there.
Want a hard lock? Get your own...but then thats where the skill comes in. And the down side of using LRMs.
The enemy can pop you with direct fire and get into cover before the LRMs even reach mid-flight.
So from an efficiency standpoint its just better to get really good with direct fire weapons first and same LRMs for niche specialty or lols. At mid-level+ skill levels of play, its very hard to make LRMs work well, which is why comps dont rely on them.
I would love for PGI to 'fix' indirect fire and the LRM/ECM dynamic but...not holding my breath.
Koniving, on 09 April 2015 - 02:20 PM, said:
This... this is why either I'm on an island or PGI is with its horns in its ears.
I don't believe they should be different games. Nor do I want them to be. And it makes me a sad puppy.
Yes... Yes I'll take that Teddy Bear. Thank you sir.
Agreed but i dont think PGI has the ability to make a boardgame into a FPS/sim with the parity we wish for.
I can settle for 'heavily themed' but mechanically different. Despite all the shortcomings, its been fun enough to keep me here.
Agreed but i dont think PGI has the ability to make a boardgame into a FPS/sim with the parity we wish for.
I can settle for 'heavily themed' but mechanically different. Despite all the shortcomings, its been fun enough to keep me here.
All too true. PGI may have looked at the rulebook, but there's little more than that. About anything you can learn on Sarna, PGI did, without considerations like time concerns. For example the big fear of heat neutrality (when using weapons 'once' over 10 seconds) would mean nothing if you can fire (and likely will) fire two to three times as fast as you can in the source material. Heat still matters and heat neutrality is mostly impossible, especially with a very limited heat threshold.
I confess there are some stone walls even when designing such a game on paper. Though I have worked out the mechanics of (and by extension a large mostly-IS advantage) both the ability to use arms more freely (such as reaching up to shoot over that wall or building) and being able to turn the mech's head. Ultimately though, for a game to have that kind of detail and still be good and functional in an online environment, the production costs would have to be lowered in other aspects such as the graphical side.
In the last 6 months they made some pretty good progress. For now though it's themed. So that works.
And true, the game can be good fun. Here's to hoping they keep it up.
Spoiler
Though I believe if PGI spent some real time on the pre-production phase... I think everything we have now and more would have gone a lot smoother.
It genuinely needs work on four key elements of balance though.
1) The power creep needs to be removed before it gets too bad.
2) Weapons balance needs to settle less on having dozens of identical weapons with identical mechanics and different stats, we need a redesign for weapons in such a way that they have true purpose. See articles One and Two.
3) The massive amount of alpha strike ability in a universe where doing such a thing would most likely kill you are the pilot if you did it all at the same time [as opposed to over time such as 10 seconds as per the source material] needs to be curbed. We can simultaneously fire up to 4x as much as what could possibly be fired in BattleTech in 10 seconds, and what's funny is if we were to fire just 2x that we'd blow up instantly in MWO where if we fire 4x that we will survive and receive minimal damage. Thresholds go from 40 minimum to up to 129 units of heat, and the DireStar generates over 1,000 heat in a single alpha strike -- but doesn't blow up... when generating 200 heat will kill you within a second or two.
Finally 4) Map design. The compelling need to bring everyone to one of three spots to congregate and kill each other does not make for a tactical game. The maps are designed with general concepts and lack the genuine thoughts of the mentalities and design of both IS and Clan pilots and weaponry. If a map has a tight funnel aligned with a long open area and some makeshift trenches, then you've created something heavily Clan advantageous. And if a map has lots of cover and enclosed spaces without open ones, then it's heavily Inner Sphere centric. There should be a fair bit of both across the map, not localized in specific places, with gradual changes from one style of area to another. There shouldn't be a long but open tunnel with a sudden narrow stop, to a suddenly open area (Boreal Rift). That's just...really awful design.
Far as LRM-using Atlases for those still looking here... Concept 1. Solid, tried and true ballistic punch. Lasers as backup. LRM softening ability and some SRMs just in case.
Concept 2. Unlike the previous one which is an LRM-using fighter, this one is more of a pure boat with close combat capabilities (and is built exactly like my own). You can recreate using an Atlas D-DC by substituting the twin LRM-5s for an LRM-10 at the loss of an extra ton. (which you will gain 4 by dropping the twin MPL). Or drop the two LRM-5s altogether and you will be able to put the build on an Atlas D.
Though, why not just build this joke Atlas and be done with it? Vid in link.
Vid on click youtube vid.
It's actually very practical, despite being a 300 engine Atlas with four ML, AC/2 and AC/5, LRM-10, SRM-6, and 1 ton of ammo per weapon, and came out to about 95 tons with full armor. Gets 6 out of 8 kills.
Or this Highlander, which was built to fight 6 PPC Stalkers and still does pretty dang well. Link, because smart phone people.
Vid straight up.
And with that, I'm gonna LRM boat in my Atlas for a bit (*Slips on Deal With It™ Glasses*) and will then probably play some Megamek or Valkyria Chronicles.
(Edit: Didn't get my ™ on the first try.)
So. First two runs with the LRM Atlas. The same one shown in "Concept 2" above. This is with only Basics unlocked. Still need a speed tweak (48.6 kph in an Atlas... a nice, proper speed. But too slow when everyone else has speed tweak with 10% more speed and higher returns for bigger and bigger engines).
Not too bad. Mind you that second one was a terrible game where I lost my LRMs within the first 2 minutes (thanks Mr. Timber Wolf + Stormcrow + Banshee combination; still got to watch all three of you die and you still didn't get to save that Stalker I was harassing! Build yourselves to be colder; overheating after a shot or two isn't good for your health, I can perform 40 shots before I overheat. A good 10 or more even after a tremendous LRM rain.)
First match I would've had at least four kills, but every time I almost killed someone, the exact same player was hammering in on the enemy at point blank using my attacks to buff his own. It was the Davion pilot in the Battlemaster.
Lost this one. Half the team went to Theta and got slaughtered, and I spent most of my time duking it out with lights while an Atlas D-DC somehow got the impression he was an AC/20, LRM-20, twin ER LL packing Sniper Raven™, peeking out to do potshots every now and then while I dealt with the swarm.
I pointed out a brawler Timber Wolf with ER MLs, MGs and SRMs. Who spent a lot more time on the map than I got to...who didn't do as well damage-wise as my twin ML, twin MPL, twin LRM-20, twin LRM-5 Atlas.
Edit: A lot more time on the map is equal to about 30 to 40 more seconds after I died before he/she died, with all sightings of friendly timber wolves being 'face time' and 'chase time' against various enemies so the player was fighting, somehow managed to lose both arms, a side torso before I died and finally a leg while I was spectating.
So as I said on pages past... Can an Atlas LRM boat? Yep. Can it do it well? Sure. Is it a good idea? Only if you have some clue of what you're doing. I genuinely don't recommend it.
(Fun fact: I died by LRMs to the rear while trying to kill a TBR-C.)
(My one kill? The Atlas D-DC, point blank brawling range because he got in the way of me almost killing the Adder. His AC/20 didn't last long and his twin ER LL overheated him quickly because... not well built to keep cold. Endurance, it's important.)
And with that -- I'm off MWO for the night.
Side note: Best damage of both teams. And I still had plenty of ammo. (Only spent about half, had plenty of laser use though).
(Last thing: The tidbit about something being in my cockpit -- When I tabbed into the game, someone's third person drone was inside my cockpit. I was like O_O Full Metal Jacket style "What is that!?" and the following line that I can't use here. Then it just phases through my windshield like a little UFO and followed a Dire Wolf out into the sunset.)
As someone who drives a DDC, I've used both brawler 2 ER LL, 3 SRM6/ AC/20 builds and dual LRM 15's 2 Ml, ac/20 builds. I kept ECM on both of them.
First off, why take the DDC if you don't grab the ECM? That's the only mistake in my eyes.
I prefer the LRM build because I stay roughly 500 meters from the scrum and support my Team. I usually end with 9 or more assists and at least a kill. I watch the radar and look for Teammates that need help and drop on the ones shooting them. If needed I roll up into AC/20 range and start popping caps.
When I used the SRM build, it sucked. I would roll into range and my whole team would leave me hanging. Oh yeah I could volley like there was no tomorrow because there was no tomorrow when you are the only guy involved with a brawl ball.
And, maybe I handicap myself because I played the Tabletop game and mixed my weapons. An Atlas carrying nothing that could hit beyond 300 meters would be scrap metal because no one would get in range. They would hang back and 1,000 paper cut the lumbering mess.
Take some ranged stuff, and take some closer range stuff and it works.
The LRM assault that hides 800 meters behind his team isn't an asset. But the one that stays close and drops his LRM love where it is needed, and then can step up to give direct support , IS an asset.
Do you remember dev blog 0 with the pillars of the game? Community warfare, information warfare, etc.
We dont have information warfare. We have PART of information warfare, a system that has been totally forgotten, and that is even worse than having none of it at all.
Having only part of information warfare is the reason ECM is so... weird...
Its also the reason everyone has free c3 slave and c3 master computers on their mech for no extra tonnage. Its ALSO the reason LRMs are NOT fire and forget.
Shared targeting means LRMs are inherently dependent upon your allies backing you up. It also means they're at a severe disadvantage, because without allies to spot for you (wasting tonnage on things like narc and tag when they could be using real weapons) you need line of sight and you need to expose yourself to track the target until the missiles hit, why bother with that, when you could simply take a direct fire weapon, expose yourself for a much shorter time, get the shot off, and get back behind cover.
LRMs also have minimum range, which is a half baked "paul got killed by LRMs so he nerfed them" thing. If you want minimum range on lrms, you'll have to put minimum range on EVERYTHING ELSE THAT HAD TT MINIMUM RANGES or it doesn't make sense and it leaves LRMs in a terrible place.
"but biggz, what other weapons had minimum ranges? I would be happy to take those!"
No you wouldn't. You wouldn't be happy when your AC2s, AC5s, and Gauss Rifles, and Lasers all had minimum ranges. You would be very very unhappy.
Minimum range has never been done in a mechwarrior game, and for good reason. There is a precedent here which paul, for some bizarre reason, has completely ignored.
We need to either flesh out information warfare completely (which is huge and wont happen in a million years) or get rid of shared targeting and fire and forget LRMs altogether, or LRMs simply will NEVER BE GOOD.
LRMS were garbage
LRMs are garbage
LRMs will continue to be garbage
this is an objective fact, which tractor joe, despite his ramblings, will never be able to refute. You cannot argue against objective facts.
This is not to say that I hate LRMs and hope they never get good. On the contrary, I love LRMs and wish I could use them to complement my primary weapons loadouts. Alot of mechs could become magnificently useful if that one missile hardpoint (not enough to use SRMs and why would you ever waste tonnage on LRMs) could be used on an LRM 20, but as of now, and for the foreseeable future, LRMs will never be worth the tonnage.
Do you remember dev blog 0 with the pillars of the game? Community warfare, information warfare, etc.
We dont have information warfare. We have PART of information warfare, a system that has been totally forgotten, and that is even worse than having none of it at all.
Having only part of information warfare is the reason ECM is so... weird...
Its also the reason everyone has free c3 slave and c3 master computers on their mech for no extra tonnage. Its ALSO the reason LRMs are NOT fire and forget.
Shared targeting means LRMs are inherently dependent upon your allies backing you up. It also means they're at a severe disadvantage, because without allies to spot for you (wasting tonnage on things like narc and tag when they could be using real weapons) you need line of sight and you need to expose yourself to track the target until the missiles hit, why bother with that, when you could simply take a direct fire weapon, expose yourself for a much shorter time, get the shot off, and get back behind cover.
LRMs also have minimum range, which is a half baked "paul got killed by LRMs so he nerfed them" thing. If you want minimum range on lrms, you'll have to put minimum range on EVERYTHING ELSE THAT HAD TT MINIMUM RANGES or it doesn't make sense and it leaves LRMs in a terrible place.
"but biggz, what other weapons had minimum ranges? I would be happy to take those!"
No you wouldn't. You wouldn't be happy when your AC2s, AC5s, and Gauss Rifles, and Lasers all had minimum ranges. You would be very very unhappy.
Minimum range has never been done in a mechwarrior game, and for good reason. There is a precedent here which paul, for some bizarre reason, has completely ignored.
We need to either flesh out information warfare completely (which is huge and wont happen in a million years) or get rid of shared targeting and fire and forget LRMs altogether, or LRMs simply will NEVER BE GOOD.
LRMS were garbage
LRMs are garbage
LRMs will continue to be garbage
this is an objective fact, which tractor joe, despite his ramblings, will never be able to refute. You cannot argue against objective facts.
This is not to say that I hate LRMs and hope they never get good. On the contrary, I love LRMs and wish I could use them to complement my primary weapons loadouts. Alot of mechs could become magnificently useful if that one missile hardpoint (not enough to use SRMs and why would you ever waste tonnage on LRMs) could be used on an LRM 20, but as of now, and for the foreseeable future, LRMs will never be worth the tonnage.
/\This is like reliving my own past of discovering first hand just how bad LRMs suck/\
Don't get me wrong, I've rolled LRM Stalkers. Had me some awesome matches in them too, top damage, most kills, all thrills, had them all. Sometimes our unit will get together and do a themed "aggressive LRM boater" night, where we spend the matches with the "W" key pressed and continuous streams of LRMs chase the enemy as they struggle to find some relief from the shaking, anger rising as they lose components but can't fight back. Those brief moments are deeply shadowed by the memories of taking continuous lumps against really good teams in CW and public drops, matches where you never get a chance to get a single lock before your face gets melted or your launchers go flying off before your first volley hits.
In the end, that's how I saw the big picture with LRMs. Against random people, you can scare the c-bills out of them with a couple of really aggressive LRM boats. Against even semi-organized teams or a majority organized group in a public drop, the LRMs suddenly fail to deliver, so you get stuck in this cycle of bouncing back and forth between lower tier players (ooh, LRMs are fun with them) to mid/top tier players (cheap victories are now balanced with continuous matches of getting rolled, #wanttoragequit)
Lrms are already the most laughably bad weapon system in this game, seeing utter windowlickers loading Atlases and Stalkers with lrms is just laughable and sad. As an assault it's in the job description to tank SOME sort of damage. If your going to waste tonnage on lrms, use a Trebuchet or Hunchback. At least it has quirks to support that utterly stupid style of play.
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Koniving, on 09 April 2015 - 02:20 PM, said:
A good 10 or more even after a tremendous LRM rain.)
