21 replies to this topic

[Foxfire kadrpg]

So often, the players at my skill level, neglect to press a single key in combat. That key is 'R' and it will lock onto an enemy when pressed. The following is a list of reasons why you SHOULD be in the habit of targeting everything, as well as a few counter-arguments for those that snobbishly insist they don't have to.

"This Team is a bunch of cowards" - How often have you seen that in chat? Someone (maybe you) charged into a situation you thought you could win, only to find you were the only one to do so. Guess what? People generally don't attack things they don't see. When a player has targeted an enemy (by pressing R) that enemy is now in view for every teammate to see, allowing all but the most zombie-minded players to focus their attention. LITTLE KNOWN FACT: when an enemy is NOT targeted, it is ONLY visible if the player has direct line of sight to it. So when you reach that hill first, and see a mech, everyone behind you will NOT see it until you target it.

"PGI Nerfed the rewards! I'm making so little now for my time" - Referencing another, well constructed guide to the latest reward breakdown: http://mwomercs.com/...-get-xp-and-cb/ you can see a number of things that can result from targeting opponents:
-if you are the first to see a mech and actually TARGET it, you receive the same amount of CBills as if you had done 95 points of damage. So if you're averaging 300 points of damage a match, you could double your income from that by simply being the first person to mash R for three mechs. If you saw an enemy lance, you made more money than 300 points of damage.
-Components: if you destroy two components on a mech, that gives you roughly the same amount of CBills as one kill. Seriously, look it up. Other factors apply, but if you simply got the killing blow on something you could have gotten the same amount of money by removing two arms. Also removing components has the added advantage of making that mech less dangerous in faster time than killing it.

"PGI should nerf [weapon], [mech]. It's too OP~!" -unless you are someone's 8 year old invited to play mechwarrior online in the hopes that he'll someday appreciate the franchise YOU grew up on, you should NOT be content to simply shoot at anything that moves. Targeting allows you to differentiate targets: There is a difference between a Kintaro 18 outfitted with SRM 6x5 (which you should strive to keep distance from) and a Kintaro 18 outfitted with LRMs (in which case you should either look for cover, or delight in charging him, chuckling that he invested so much in an weapon layout dependent upon you keeping your distance.)
Seriously: I've observed the sole survivor of our team, faced with an enemy that obviously had LRM 15 with a single medium laser, literally BACK UP until his opponent could fire at him with the more devastating weapon array. We might call this stupidity on the panic of being at the end of a rough match, but surely the patience of mind to target and appraise could have saved him.

"What's a good mech to get?" -Why scour the forums for 'good builds' or 'mechs' when the battlefield will clearly give you a tour of practicality. I've purchased a Kintaro 18 when I observed one successfully take down an enemy Battlemaster and Direwolf (damaged, but STILL, both in the same battle) because it had SRMs. Start targeting and reading the layouts on the field, and you can see for yourself what seems to work.

[Mercworks]

The biggest group of people who fail to hit "R" regularly are, ironically, people with a lot of First Person Shooter experience. They are so used to fighting with twitch reflexes and an occasional reference to the mini-map that they don't often look at the big picture. Mechs are too tough to one-shot, and the difference between taking off a torso and accumulating damage to the CT for the kill can be tremendous.

[Motroid]

Foxfire kadrpg, on 14 September 2015 - 12:08 PM, said:

People generally don't attack things they don't see. When a player has targeted an enemy (by pressing R) that enemy is now in view for every teammate to see, allowing all but the most zombie-minded players to focus their attention. LITTLE KNOWN FACT: when an enemy is NOT targeted, it is ONLY visible if the player has direct line of sight to it. So when you reach that hill first, and see a mech, everyone behind you will NOT see it until you target it.

I stand corrected. Nothing to add. OP is right.

Edited by Motroid, 28 September 2015 - 01:31 PM.

[Tustle]

Motroid, on 15 September 2015 - 09:09 AM, said:

Sorry but thats not true. If I get a red triangle, my team gets the dorito as well. No need to press "R". If the triangle is hollow, noone tagets it via "R" if it is full red then another one in my team has already pressed "R" to target said dorito.
Basic scouting for enemy mechs is possible without needing to press "R" 'shrugs' but for details on loadout, paperdoll and LRM support you need to press R.

Speaking from experience here I've had multiple instances now where a friendly 'mech who's stumbled into enemy fighters quickly tap their targeting button to rapidly ping the instances to the rest of us so they're visible on radar albeit rapidly blinking. We; or at least I; don't see any hollow triangles whatsoever unless they're right in my view and targetable (read: not under ECM cover and/or not out of sensor range), nor do they appear to show up on radar for everyone else unless they're targeted by a friendly or a friendly UAV.

Repeat: hollow triangles appear only for you and indicate a 'mech either unseen by your friendlies or not targeted by your friendlies. They won't see the mark on radar and may be unable to target the accompanying enemy 'mech or even be aware it's there until you've locked it.
So shoot the friendlies looking out for you some help and lock your targets, MechWarriors!
(Yes, even if you want the kill on the last live AFKer you soulless monkeys.)

Sheesh...I hope the pair of Victor pilots I saw last night read this forum...and or take some lessons in staying in motion when fighting...

[Lugh]

Motroid, on 16 September 2015 - 05:50 AM, said:

And again i put it simple: to cause doritos (target triangles) for your teammembers it is NOT necessary to press "R"!
When you see and hear doritos blinking with that distinctive sound it is your scout going in and out of sensor range or line of sight because of terrain or JJing. Not that scout mashing "R".
For example when playing on Mining collective and every group picks their lane (more or less) and I head out scouting and see a deathball of enemies without ECM within my sensor range (800m/90degree) when taking a really high jump in my Mist Lynx this will cause all the doritos and blips to pop up for just this second on my teammembers HUD and minimap while I am airborne maintaining line of sight. No need to press "R".
However for loadout details and LRMs pressing "R" is required all along with maintaining LoS for long enough which is a diffrent story.
Again it is exactly those things that are about to change soon, but atm it's like I described it. Go run some tests with a buddy in private lobby...

nope. it is the passive detection of red doritoes for you personally or the LOCKED solid triangles of your teammates.

[Wildstreak]

I have given up telling people. There seems to always be at least one who flat out refuses like the people who refuse to turn 2x Zoom off and keep missing their target.

[Tesunie]

Motroid, on 15 September 2015 - 09:09 AM, said:

Sorry but thats not true. If I get a red triangle, my team gets the dorito as well. No need to press "R". If the triangle is hollow, noone tagets it via "R" if it is full red then another one in my team has already pressed "R" to target said dorito.
Basic scouting for enemy mechs is possible without needing to press "R" 'shrugs' but for details on loadout, paperdoll and LRM support you need to press R.
This is as it stands now - but it's exactly these things that are about to change fundamentally...

As someone who uses LRMs often, you are misinformed here.

To put it politely, unless you are lock on (by pressing R), then no one else on your team can see your unlocked targets. A hollow red triangle over what you are seeing is an indication that you are the only one able to see said target. If you can't see the mech and have a hollow red triangle "randomly" on your screen with no corresponding enemy mech to match, then it's because a fellow teammate has locked that target.

I can't inform you how many times (even before ECM) I've ran around a corner to where I see a teammate, only to be surprised by the entire enemy team because my teammate was fighting without any target locks (failed to press R). (I don't always use just LRMs.)


If you need more information on spotting and gaining locks, I have some guides written by myself on the subject.

[Commander A9]

I keep calling tactics and encouraging people to move by lances to maneuver and flank around; it works sometimes, but then players chicken out and turn around and decide to hug the main group and move as a 12-man ball. It doesn't work all the time.

I move, hoping, begging, encouraging the team to send a few guys my way...and I'm the one who ends up taking point. If I'm shot, I don't slow down, stop, and back up-that only leaves you MORE EXPOSED to enemy fire. You move FORWARD to cover, because you're faster moving forward; AND the teammates BEHIND you can shoot the enemy and not your back.

But people don't get this...People are so scared to move up, it makes me absolutely furious. Maybe it's my Abrams Tank and armored tactics experience talking, but...I wish more people were familiar with tank tactics in this game. They're not that difficult to grasp.

Edited by Commander A9, 18 September 2015 - 07:14 AM.

[Tesunie]

Commander A9, on 18 September 2015 - 07:12 AM, said:

But people don't get this...People are so scared to move up, it makes me absolutely furious.

Had a CW match on Sulfur (with those new spawns that are poorly added in, with two narrow easy to block and shoot into exits) where my entire team was being prevented from pushing out of spawn because of a single Hellbringer. I got tired of seeing a Stalker's backside and decided to charge out. It was a single Hellbringer! Needless to say, thankfully my team followed me after I barreled into the Hellbringer in my Grasshopper.

People are afraid of taking damage it seems. Sometimes you do need to pull back. Sometimes you need to push forwards. However, when you have several mechs trapped behind you, and only a single enemy mech is making you hide, you need to move out. Once you do, you'll get those "several" mechs you've been blocking into the fight, and that one mech will drop quickly enough.

No one wants to take point. Everyone wants to be 2nd, 3rd or farther down the pushing line. This is because whomever pushes tends to take the damage, and tends to drop first. (Which then means less damage, less match score, less rewards.)

[Motroid]

Lugh, on 16 September 2015 - 06:38 AM, said:

nope. it is the passive detection of red doritoes for you personally or the LOCKED solid triangles of your teammates.

Yeah, I was wrong on the issue. I stand corrected. Somehow I was thinking hollow triangles appear on everybodys HUD. Only solid triangles do.

[QuulDrah]

found 3 teammates trading laser volleys with red team for quite some time... (one is down to 60% already)
took me a couple of seconds more to round the corner in my assault.
i get treated to the sight of four red mechs shooting back...
i keep spamming R out of habit... and get 3 'Scouting' rewards.?!?

more people need to read your post!

Edited by QuulDrah, 02 October 2015 - 05:26 AM.

[stalima]

just tell people that targeting with the R key can increase their targets damage intake by up to 1100%

[Tarogato]

Tank Man, on 15 September 2015 - 10:11 AM, said:

So shoot the friendlies looking out for you

... phrasing.

[no one]

It's important to know where your enemies are. It's often even more important to know where your friendlies are.

Locks, UAVS, TAG, NARC some people simply don't check their radars, ever. What decides a match is as much knowing what's rounded the corner with you as it is knowing what you've rounded the corner into.

Tesunie, on 18 September 2015 - 08:03 AM, said:

No one wants to take point. Everyone wants to be 2nd, 3rd or farther down the pushing line. This is because whomever pushes tends to take the damage, and tends to drop first. (Which then means less damage, less match score, less rewards.)

This is very true, and you're often met with 70 tonnes of roadblock if you have a pressing need to kick your 'Mech into reverse. There's no reward for running point, and it's more or less suicide unless one or both sides have been split up or whittled down to 'not enough weapons to kill in a focused alpha'. Getting in close with brawler weapons is difficult and unrewarding. Ranged weapons, especially large lasers and Gauss, let people engage and deplete the opposition while they are still at long range without exposing themselves to undivided attention. Just another face of the meta.

[DailyFrankPeter]

This, forgive me for saying, but still is obscure knowledge in MWO. Somehow I was able to make through tutorials and into tier 3 not knowing that "uncycled" (with "R") contacts are all invisible to my team. This explains a lot (of losses). Other sources only say: "radar contacts are shared as long as friends are connected to you by radar range".

Perhaps this should be the 2nd thing to shout in PUG matches in chat.

Edited by DailyFrankPeter, 11 October 2015 - 12:33 AM.

[DannDruid]

Nobody mentioned this so I thought I would-with the plague of ecm mechs(clan) we don't even get the option to "Hit R" because the 6 enemy mechs are under 5 overlapping ecm fields and untargetable outside 180 meters...Plus Radar Deprivation...When all the ecm was slow assaults or undergunned lights this happened much less often.

[DailyFrankPeter]

DannDruid, on 11 October 2015 - 09:19 AM, said:

Nobody mentioned this so I thought I would-with the plague of ecm mechs(clan) we don't even get the option to "Hit R" because the 6 enemy mechs are under 5 overlapping ecm fields and untargetable

I find this effect a bit OP actually (I don't mind the lengthened missile locking). I tried Beagle Probes, computer & stuff to combat this; a counter-ecm usually can't close the necessary distance before the brawl ensues (but I think maybe helps once that happens); in the end I just dropped all the electronic junk and settled for calling enemies out in chat (sector and count). Works OK, except I'm never sure of pub team's spacial awareness and memory.

Edited by DailyFrankPeter, 12 October 2015 - 06:19 AM.

[QuulDrah]

you are aware of the effects of TAG lasers, (ER-)PPC hits, and 'J' ? all three counter ECM

[DailyFrankPeter]

QuulDrah, on 12 October 2015 - 06:20 AM, said:

you are aware of the effects of TAG lasers, (ER-)PPC hits, and 'J' ? all three counter ECM

TAG has a problem between hills and buildings. J is setting your ECM to couter mode, for which you still need to be in range, i.e. "accompany" the enemy.

Hang on. What does PPC do to ECM?

Edited by DailyFrankPeter, 12 October 2015 - 06:24 AM.

[QuulDrah]

PPC hit -> ECM offline for 4sec (i think, it might be 3 or 5)