37 replies to this topic

[Caboose30]

Okay, so clearly enormous amounts of constructive feedback has a reaction. Post your constructive reasons for either not liking ECM, wanting it tweaked, wanting it kept the same, or wanting it gone entirely here. Keep this topic on top if you can.

Edited by JuiceCaboose, 09 March 2013 - 02:32 PM.

[Caboose30]

Oh, and please post on here so this thread stays up high enough for people to read it. I know the poll makes things easy, but it doesn't keep the post on top.

[Stone Profit]

This bs again? Did we need another damned ecm poll to whine about ecm? No we didnt. Its fine if you can't hack it against ecm youre not gonna like this game ever. Ill finish with another thing we dont need more of. L2play.

[Caboose30]

Stone Profit, on 09 March 2013 - 02:43 PM, said:

This bs again? Did we need another damned ecm poll to whine about ecm? No we didnt. Its fine if you can't hack it against ecm youre not gonna like this game ever. Ill finish with another thing we dont need more of. L2play.

You're so constructive in your response, I love it.

[Livebait]

It's been talked to death, and then some. It's broken along with LRM's, Ssrms, AMS, laser recharge sound, 3L hit box and the list goes on and on and on... But hey we got a new "hero mech!!!!"

But its okay, I play MWO for about 30 minutes a week with my merc corp and I'm set. If a new patch comes out, I'll play for about an hour.

[Cest7]

Ditch the cloak entirely

[Kartr]

Currently ECMs have a couple of things that they didn't have an that is whats creating the problem.

Things ECM currently has that its not supposed to:
1. The make it so you can't detect the 'Mechs inside its bubble outside of a certain range. Traditional ECM doesn't do this.
2. Prevents missile locks on targets inside the ECM bubble. Only Angel ECM did this and only against Streaks. Regular semi-guided locks with LRMs (the way we target LRMs now) were not affected and neither were Streaks under the Guardian ECM.
3. Prevents you from getting locks on anything if you are in an enemy bubble. Traditional ECM doesn't do this.
4. Prevents you and your teammates from seeing each other if you (or they) are in an enemy bubble. Traditional ECM doesn't do this.
5. Eliminates the TAG bonus. Traditional ECM doesn't do this.

What ECM is supposed to do:
1. Cancel Artemis bonus.
2. Cancel Narc bonus.
3. Cancel BAP bonus, while letting the BAP equipped unit know its being jammed.
4. Block C3 networks.

Traditionally if one of my 'Mechs can see an ECM equipped 'Mech any of my other 'Mechs with LOS or indirect weapons can target it. If the spotting 'Mech is inside the bubble this is still true. LRMs achieve their semi-guided locks with no penalties on an ECM equipped 'Mech. SSRMs still get locks on Guardian ECM.

Remove the things ECM isn't supposed to do and only give it what it is supposed to do and that will go a long ways towards fixing the OPness of ECM. And yes I know that helps LRMs, but balancing them should be easy enough just increase the number of individual missiles that miss.

[Hawks]

Voted 2,3 and 5.

One idea I had was to enable BAP-equipped mechs to *see* the ECM field - even if they can't actually see what's in it. A marker could show on the mini-map, and perhaps some sort of visual effect on the HUD as well, to indicate the disrupted area. This would actually make BAP useful, and would actually reflect what it is supposed to be able to do canonically.

[Pater Mors]

Yay another ECM thread.

[Kartr]

Hawks, on 09 March 2013 - 05:34 PM, said:

Voted 2,3 and 5.

One idea I had was to enable BAP-equipped mechs to *see* the ECM field - even if they can't actually see what's in it. A marker could show on the mini-map, and perhaps some sort of visual effect on the HUD as well, to indicate the disrupted area. This would actually make BAP useful, and would actually reflect what it is supposed to be able to do canonically.

I like this! BAP is supposed to be canceled by ECM, but when canceled its supposed to know that its being jammed. A sort of hazy bubble on screen where ECM fields are would make BAP worth taking and help keep ECM fields from cloaking whole teams to point blank range. Good idea Hawks.

[Headlessnewt]

I couldn't care less about what Guardian ECM is 'supposed' to do based on TT rules.

But I do think that it should be of a power level where if everyone carried and ECM, it would not unbalance the game.

My fix:

• Remove the detection prevention bubble, as soon as someone enters your sensor range, regardless of ECM, you get a red triangle over their head and may target them. ECM increases the time to identify the target's mech type, pilot and weapons loadout, as well as increasing the Missile Lock time by 5 times and doubles target decay after leaving LoS.
  
• If you are being jammed by someone with ECM (you are within 180m of them), you cannot broadcast or receive target information to others (as currently), but you can still generate your own locks with LoS.
  
• NARC should not be affected by ECM in any way, it's already crap enough as it is.
  
• Artemis should be nullified when being used against a target inside an ECM bubble.

This makes ECM effective at denying information (point 1), effective at preventing a unit from gaining information benefits from allies (point 2), and reduces the effectiveness of a system currently considered to be extremely potent (Point 4). This also encourages the use of a system that is currently underpowered (point 3).

[Kartr]

Headlessnewt, on 09 March 2013 - 05:53 PM, said:

I couldn't care less about what Guardian ECM is 'supposed' to do based on TT rules.

And this folks is where all our problems stem from, not caring about TT rules. The TT has been worked on a balanced for the last 25 years and its still not perfect, but its a heck of a lot better than trying to figure out balance from scratch. TT is also where the game comes from and is what BattleTech is, you toss out TT and you don't have BattleTech any more. You also have to rebalance everything from scratch if you don't start with TT functions/numbers. Everything should start out in its tabletop incarnation and then be adjusted from there to fit the medium, not just made up on the fly. If the Devs had done this with ECM it wouldn't be the overpowered cloaking device we are stuck with today.

[Headlessnewt]

Kartr, on 09 March 2013 - 06:00 PM, said:

The TT has been worked on a balanced for the last 25 years and its still not perfect, but its a heck of a lot better than trying to figure out balance from scratch.

TT is not balanced. It's not even close to balanced. I've been playing it for 15 years, I'd know. The only way it's balanced is in that everyone can theoretically do the same things, so everyone can cheese out equally, which is a kind of fair. I work in tabletop game design, I know what balance looks like. BattleTech is a good game and a fair game, but not because it is balanced.

MWO can be better than TT. MWO can fix problems that TT has had for 25 years and will never change due to inertia by changing implementation on things if fanboys like you don't insist that playing FPS BattleTech is a good idea. Every Mechwarrior game since the dawn of time has changed things from the tabletop due to the nature of implementation.

MWO is a FPS/Mech simulator, and BattleTech is a tabletop game. Apples cannot equal oranges and trying to make them work the same will result in everyone being disappointed.

ECM doing what it does in tabletop wouldn't be a bad fix, but it's not the best fix.

[Caboose30]

I think - like they did with almost everything else in the game - they should start with TT as a base, implement it and get feedback, and then adjust it accordingly. As I started in a similar thread, this is absolutely no adjustment or communications based on peoples' displeasure of ECM other than "Working as intended" or "No plans for adjustment at this time". That's not a very fitting answer to "What's your reaction to so many people finding ECM to be overpowered?"

[Rakash]

Headlessnewt, on 09 March 2013 - 06:15 PM, said:

TT is not balanced. It's not even close to balanced. I've been playing it for 15 years, I'd know. The only way it's balanced is in that everyone can theoretically do the same things, so everyone can cheese out equally, which is a kind of fair. I work in tabletop game design, I know what balance looks like. BattleTech is a good game and a fair game, but not because it is balanced.

MWO can be better than TT. MWO can fix problems that TT has had for 25 years and will never change due to inertia by changing implementation on things if fanboys like you don't insist that playing FPS BattleTech is a good idea. Every Mechwarrior game since the dawn of time has changed things from the tabletop due to the nature of implementation.

MWO is a FPS/Mech simulator, and BattleTech is a tabletop game. Apples cannot equal oranges and trying to make them work the same will result in everyone being disappointed.

ECM doing what it does in tabletop wouldn't be a bad fix, but it's not the best fix.

No, but it's the best start.

[Rakash]

I will also re-offer this bit I already wrote on it..

...that's because they made ECM do WAY more than it's supposed to do. BAP, TAG, NARC, and Artemis are supposed to enhance the capabilities of basic equipment (weapons and sensors). ECM is supposed to cancel those E-war components AND NOTHING ELSE, making your 1.5 tons cancel all the tons of Artemis, BAP, and TAG the enemy is carrying in your 180m sphere. That's what ECM is, the equalizer.

Valid things it does now include blocking enemy E-war components, blocking targeting data sharing between enemy units within/through the ECM sphere (as these functions mimic C3 components which are SPECIFICALLY COUNTERED by ECM) and completely hiding shut down battlemechs within the area of effect.

Invalid functions include preventing target locks on friendly units in the area of effect (Battlemech sensor suites are not entirely disrupted by ECM and may therefore acquire and lock targets in LOS, regardless of location relative to the AoE) and preventing targeting data sharing between enemy units not inside the AoE whose line of effect does not pass through the AoE.

The point of ECM in paper-scissors-rock is hammer. It doesn't win the game, it cancels the game and puts us back to basics.

[Tangelis]

JuiceCaboose, on 09 March 2013 - 06:49 PM, said:

I think - like they did with almost everything else in the game - they should start with TT as a base, implement it and get feedback, and then adjust it accordingly. As I started in a similar thread, this is absolutely no adjustment or communications based on peoples' displeasure of ECM other than "Working as intended" or "No plans for adjustment at this time". That's not a very fitting answer to "What's your reaction to so many people finding ECM to be overpowered?"

I think you are right about starting with a TT base and adjusting accordingly. Actually, I'm not sure how long you have been playing but that is exactly what they did in many areas at first. PGI has not stuck to that initial intent however, and much of that has to do with the fact that PGI actually does take the communities feedback into consideration. A little too much at times I think (Coolant flush......really???) but who am I to judge.

So many people reacting in the manner of "ECM is too Overpowered" is not all that suprising. I am not saying it doesn't need toning or adjustments. It is however even in its current form far from unbeatable, it just isn't an easy button. Something I have noticed after 2 decades of gaming is becoming more and more of a popular trend that games are for some reason not meant to represent any form of challenge or obstacle to overcome.

People will scream and rant about all sorts of things they consider to be "unfair" or "op'd" simply because they are quite effective. Bottom line however is whether it's ECM or a splatcat there is a way to beat it and soundly.

[Billygoat]

All in all, I'm OK with "get rid of it" at the moment. At least long enough for it to be completely reworked before returning to the game (just like collisions are/were). Lock-on weapons would probably need reexamination in the interim as well, though.

Otherwise toning it down to being an actual trade-off to consider rather than a total no-brainer on any mech that can equip it would be fine. Maybe a larger weight or huge heat cost? Maybe it should disrupt the user or have some negative effect on friendlies in the field so that "follow the D-DC" isn't the epitome of strategy? Maybe you can't fire your weapons while it's active or they will disrupt the ECM field (like a Star Trek cloaking device)? I don't know. But right now it's extremely powerful with zero downside and that seems wrong.

While I don't find that it "ruins the game" or anything, it does seem like very little thought went into it before it entered the game and the adjustments it has seen since have been few-to-none.

Edited by Billygoat, 09 March 2013 - 07:57 PM.

[Ialti]

Kartr, on 09 March 2013 - 06:00 PM, said:

And this folks is where all our problems stem from, not caring about TT rules. The TT has been worked on a balanced for the last 25 years and its still not perfect, but its a heck of a lot better than trying to figure out balance from scratch. TT is also where the game comes from and is what BattleTech is, you toss out TT and you don't have BattleTech any more. You also have to rebalance everything from scratch if you don't start with TT functions/numbers. Everything should start out in its tabletop incarnation and then be adjusted from there to fit the medium, not just made up on the fly. If the Devs had done this with ECM it wouldn't be the overpowered cloaking device we are stuck with today.

Please don't speak for me--my problems don't come from not following TT rules closely enough.
And as just a little side note: this is a video game. BattleTech TT games are table top games. The two things are different. Saying they're the same is like saying my car is the exact same thing as a cessna, just because both use internal combustion engines.

[Livewyr]

The thing is.. ECM threads would stop.. if PGI would take an active vocal stance... at least tell us once and for all whether they plan on changing the way ECM operates, so we can either rejoice in the possible balance.. or leave.. "Tweaking" (adding pointless "counters) doesn't tell us anything (good).

(Currently, I'm giving it until my Prem runs out or my Heart of the Swarm arrives, whichever comes first.)