58 replies to this topic

[Cpt Jason McCarthy]

LRMs need to return to 1 damage per missiles.

With the new patch now, the flight path of LRMs has been change for something more realistic, but "I" think that LRMs should be low damages high reliability weapons and SRMS should be High Damage/High reliability/Very Low DPS because of a relock system but that's not the topic.

So in my opinion it would be better if LRMs had a higher speed, better tracking [now its possible to do so with the netcode improvements] but low damages.

Because, if you are unlucky/TAGed or aimed by a mech with Artemis especially since the last update ... your are wrecked, because of the huge amount of damages you will receive in the torso.

It would be a good solution for all the problem we have currently with these weapons. And most
of us will stop complaining.

[dal10]

least they are better than during the festival of artemis...

[MegaBusta]

Gotta agree here.
Took my Dual ALRM20 CPLT-C1 for a test drive on the training grounds.

Started messing around a bit. Anything I had LoS to and TAG'd was dead within two volleys, except for the Atlas, which took three.
Now obviously this is against still targets, but in reality it's not far off. The damage I can do with this now is DEVASTATING. I don't even want to know what a LRM Stalker can do.

[Zyllos]

Hey look, more damage only going to the torso sections!

Just reinforcing my theories that arms are never targeted because it's too easy to hit torsos.

[LaserAngel]

MegaBusta, on 05 March 2013 - 06:58 PM, said:

Gotta agree here.
Took my Dual ALRM20 CPLT-C1 for a test drive on the training grounds.

Started messing around a bit. Anything I had LoS to and TAG'd was dead within two volleys, except for the Atlas, which took three.
Now obviously this is against still targets, but in reality it's not far off. The damage I can do with this now is DEVASTATING. I don't even want to know what a LRM Stalker can do.

That's pretty much my experience in my Catapult C1. It's not just the torso section, they're going for the CT.

[dal10]

Zyllos, on 05 March 2013 - 08:33 PM, said:

Hey look, more damage only going to the torso sections!

Just reinforcing my theories that arms are never targeted because it's too easy to hit torsos.

my atlas has 32 points of arm armor a piece, any more is unnecessary

[ICEFANG13]

Its amazing how they hone in now. They are really powerful like a huge drill.

[Corvus Antaka]

Yeah the new swirl looks cool, but they do seem to hit a lot tighter. Not convinced they are OP though when you consider that it is so hard to use them vs a good team with ECM and that uses cover wisely. LRMS need to hit hard, because a lot of ammo is just suppression and flying off into nothingness. I'm not unhappy with the current state of LRMS, though they still track & turn too well imho.

[LegoPirate]

3 flights of lrm 20's core my phract with an XL. pretty silly that a weapon that doesnt even require LoS can cause more damage then an ac20.

[LaserAngel]

LegoPirate, on 05 March 2013 - 09:56 PM, said:

3 flights of lrm 20's core my phract with an XL. pretty silly that a weapon that doesnt even require LoS can cause more damage then an ac20.

The Cataphract has always had a bad hitbox against LRMs. Even before this patch my Artemis LRMs would always strip the torso and only it.

[Joker Two]

I took the trial TBT-7M out on testing grounds, for the sake of trying the chassis, and found that LRM damage and grouping has been vastly increased and narrowed, respectively.

Here are the tests I ran:

Target: COM-1B Commando, stationary, square-on to front.
Firer: TBT-7M Trebuchet, stationary, square-on to front.
Shot: 2x LRM-15, guided fire, 250m, clear LOS.
Salvo One: Target Destroyed.

A little startling, but a good cluster or crit on the SRM ammo could easily explain this.

Target: CDA-2A Cicada, stationary, square-on to front.
Firer: TBT-7M Trebuchet, moving 81kph, torso-twisted 15 degrees left.
Shot: 2x LRM-15, guided fire, 400m, clear LOS.
Salvo One: Target Destroyed.

Pretty surprising, but I'm not familiar with the armor layout or CT hitbox, so still credible.

Target: AS7-D Atlas, stationary, square-on to front.
Firer: TBT-7M, stationary, torso-twisted 30 degrees left.
Shot: 2x LRM-15, dumb fire, 550m, clear LOS.
Salvo One: Dark red armor RT, orange armor CT, yellow armor RA, LT, and HD.
Salvo Two: Destroyed RT and RA, orange internal CT, orange armor LT and HD, yellow armor RL.
Salvo Three: Target Destroyed.

Scary results, especially since by TT rules, 78 of those 90 missiles would have to strike the CT to destroy the 'Mech, and MWO has doubled armor values relative to weapon damage. This means that, given the spread evidenced in the first two salvoes, MWO LRMs must be dealing AT LEAST their tabletop values relative to armor, DOUBLE that of the baseline for weapons. Also, the spread is much tighter, as by TT rules only about 16 missiles would have hit the CT, and alone of all the weapon systems LRM spreads still (in theory) mimic TT hit distribution by aiming for the CT but spreading out around it.

Not believing my results, I did the following:

Target: CN9-A Centurion, stationary, 60-degree right oblique.
Firer: TBT-7M, moving 81kph, jumpjetting, Actively torso-twisting between 15- to 60-degrees left on each salvo.
Shot: 2x LRM-15, dumb fire, 450m, LOS blocked except for at the peak of the jump arc.
Salvo One: Orange armor RA, RT, CT, yellow armor RL, LT, LA, LL, HD.
Salvo Two: Destroyed RA, RT, dark yellow internal CT, RL, red armor LT, HD, orange armor LA, LL.
Salvo Three: Target Destroyed.

Basically, I did everything I could think of to decrease my accuracy and spread missiles across as much of the target as possible, and still destroyed the target with three volleys. At this point I was out of LRM ammo, and re-lauinched the testing grounds.

I then tested LRMs dumb-fire against static objects, and found that at 250m, stationary, dumb-fire, square-on, the hit grouping from three salvoes (90 missiles) was smaller than the torso crosshair.


Conclusion: LRMs have vastly decreased missile spread, to the point where they will not even damage all locations of larger 'Mechs, while their total damage per volley is at least twice that of an equivalent tonnage of PPCs. (6x LRM-15 salvos killed an Atlas while spreading damage, 6x PPCs will need at least two volleys focused on the CT to do so.)

Solution: Increase the spread of LRMs by a significant margin (i.e. 50% or more). Further increase the spread of LRMs fired without missile lock (perhaps by 100% total). Decrease the damage of LRMs by a significant margin (at least 25%, likely 50% or more).


NARC Beacons had negligible effect on the groupings fired at 'Mechs, and I noticed that if I moved out of LOS of NARC'ed targets, I lost both target and missile lock. I am not sure if this is how it should function or not, but was not how I envisioned the system functioning, even after reading its description on the forums.

[DocBach]

I'm thinking they really need to readjust LRM's, unless they've got an MC only AMS system that shoots down all missiles planned, which wouldn't surprise me now.

[Critical Fumble]

Theoretically, I could agree to 1 damage a missile for LRMs provided they were no longer directly negated by ECM, and that they had their speed increased to 500 or 700 m/s.

I'm fuzzy on the specifics, but I think they ought not let multiple LRM buffs stack on a target. Possibly make only the best buff count with Narc being the best, Artemis being second, and TAG being the least helpful.

_{With the off-topic SRM bit, I think they ought to make them follow a cylinder, not a cone, as they diminish in effectiveness right out of the tube, making them best as a run up and melt peoples' faces off weapon, which is a rather. . . screwy game element.}

[Corvus Antaka]

Critical Fumble, on 05 March 2013 - 11:31 PM, said:

Theoretically, I could agree to 1 damage a missile for LRMs provided they were no longer directly negated by ECM, and that they had their speed increased to 500 or 700 m/s.

I'm fuzzy on the specifics, but I think they ought not let multiple LRM buffs stack on a target. Possibly make only the best buff count with Narc being the best, Artemis being second, and TAG being the least helpful.

_{With the off-topic SRM bit, I think they ought to make them follow a cylinder, not a cone, as they diminish in effectiveness right out of the tube, making them best as a run up and melt peoples' faces off weapon, which is a rather. . . screwy game element.}

I'd say 1.5 damage with 25% more overall spread for now. But with ECM as it is now, LRM's are still pretty worthless if you run into an ECM heavy side that has half a brain.Nurfing LRMS given the state of ECM will just make things worse.

[Xenroth]

Just can agree, I played my LRM Stalker yesterday, he has 70 LRM per volley and it took me 2 volleys to core an Atlas walking torwards me, the second volley cored him and gave him orage/red internal Center Torso ... I just thought wat da fuq?
In the end he was charging me from 500 meters and didnt even reached the 200 ...

I'm not sure about the damage but they should test around something like 1.5 damage per missile or 1.3 but 1.0 is too low if you ask me but they shall test it and rebalance ... hopefully they will test it and rebalance it ...

[John MatriX82]

Yes LRMs should be nerfed a bit. I'm not saying that their damage should be reduced to 1, but something should be done, or reduce them to 1.5 and render AMS a little bit more competitive against lrm 50 or 60 boats.

[Guarditan]

I tested my awesome with 3xlrm15+artemis and i'm really suprissed. LRM are now powerfull. I don't think that nerfing the damage would solve the problem. One balancefactor always was that lrms spread their damage all over the mech. I think a little more spread and a buff of the ams would solve the problem.

edit: I think the biggest problem of lrm wasn't the damage at all or the point of the damage infliction it just was ecm. So buffing the lrm could lead to the problem that lrm can be op in fights without ecm and still be useless if the enemy can hide beneath ecm.
Fixing the ecm problem will give us the real picture of the lrm.

Edited by Guarditan, 06 March 2013 - 03:18 AM.

[Hresvelgr]

Are you judging about weapon effectiveness by looking at [weapon]boats? This is an old forum whine "nerf that x-boat, because it keeps killing me", IMHO. Right now ECM-equipped team (especially if they're not stupid enough to throw away AMS and ignore cover) is quite well protected against LRMs. Taking into account that LRM boats (especially those that don't have any other weapons for close range) are as dangerous as sleeping babies within range of 180 m, this is not actually a problem.

[Mawai]

Last I read LRMs were doing 1.8 damage/missile and SRMs were doing 2.5 damage/missile.

However, your test results would tend to explain some of my recent results in matches. I have been totally ripped apart by LRM fire .. folks in Line of Sight using Artemis and in some cases TAG.

Looks like LRM balance may be off again ... just like the time they changed the arcs so they came straight down ... though not quite so bad.

What I don't understand is ... didn't someone sit down and do the simple tests one of the players did on the Testing Ground map to see how effective LRMs (and all the other weapons) are?

Edited by Mawai, 06 March 2013 - 07:32 AM.

[Mechteric]

Take a look on the other side of the LRMs instead of just on the side of being hit by them. Note that I only scarcely use LRMs, mostly on mediums as harassment not as a slow boat.


Firstly, the missile lock has to be maintained the entire flight, which means the LRM source cannot hit other targets between volleys. Additionally if the target moves behind cover the LRMs will either lose lock or smash against the cover. The target generally has a few to several seconds to react to the LRMs, so unless they are horribly slow or out of position they can many times get to cover. Also this lengthy flight time lets you know pretty much exactly the position of the source LRM mech.

Second is AMS, while currently not heavily used will likely see an increase in usage due to the newly discovered effectiveness of LRMs. Since AMS can be mounted by multiple mechs to protect each other this can further reduce the effectiveness of LRMs.

Thirdly, ECM mechs merely need to be in the vicinity of an LRM source to completely remove its fire effectiveness.

Fourthly, the damage from LRMs spread over the entire mech rather than pinpoint precision like snipers. While this has its uses it generally leads to slower Time to Kill.

Edited by CapperDeluxe, 06 March 2013 - 07:51 AM.